Lesson
by Sakurazukamori6
Summary: Takes place during the Spider's Grudge Arc. Doumeki, remembering the advice he got from Yuko, isn't willing to just let Watanuki have his way anymore.DoumekiWatanuki.
1. Life's Lesson

**A/N:** Takes place after Doumeki gets Mr. Spider to throw a huge hissy fit, and Watanuki asks Yuko to take his eye and release Doumeki of the grudge placed on him by Mr. Daddy Long Legs. (Aka. one hell of a bitchy spider.) Jeez, remind me to never squash one of those guys again. Oh and did anyone notice how Clamp has a great love of taking away people's eyes…cough, cough (Points frantically at my author's penname) Seishirou anyone? I swear Doumeki's another Seishirou in the making…okay maybe not so creepy, but what can you expect, boy's still hitting puberty.

* * *

It's not enough that I have to watch you suffer, but I have to watch you suffer alone. 

_Get angry and teach him. Because right now he has no idea how much he's hurting you._

It's not enough. It's never enough with you.

_Get angry and teach him._

My words mean nothing to you; my outstretched hand isn't something you'll take out of want, but grudging need. And you're a selfish person when it comes to your feelings, Watanuki.

_Get angry._

You back me into a corner, and then expect me to be fine with that. You act like you're the only one in the world who understands anything. You act like I'm not even here.

_And Teach Him!_

I can't watch you like this. I can't just let you do as you please.

_Teach Him!_

Please just listen to me Watanuki…because you're hurting me.

* * *

He's sitting in front of me, and copying notes from the board, like he always does. The sounds of the pencil scribbling mindlessly and him shuffling about in his seat the only things that I can hear. His head is tilted to the side and I don't have to see his face to know that he's squinting. 

Because he wears glasses and now on top of that, he's half blind.

He shifts his head to the other side, trying to see around the student in front of him, and then he's stretching that long neck and straightening his back, slightly raised from his seat and peering from under his bangs and glasses.

He has to try _so_ hard to take some stupid notes.

No one notices. They all just continue to mindlessly take their own notes, while he raises himself a little from his seat and scribbles some more.

No one notices him at all.

Only me.

"Hey."

He's still scratching away on his notepad and I kick the leg of his desk. It rattles his delicate position on his tiptoes and he nearly falls forward.

"Hey."

He's trying to ignore me, so he writes some more notes.

"I'll lend you my notes if you turn around."

He stops writing. Seats himself properly in his seat. Turns around and crooks one of his slender eyebrows at me. "My name's not Hey."

"Here." I extend my hand out and hand him my notebook.

"My name's not Here either." He grumbles, and then takes it from me begrudgingly.

He looks back up at me, slow and blinking, and taken over with recently uncovered sadness. Every time I look him in the eye, every time I catch the sight of that white bandage, it reminds me of what is under it.

The cold whiteness of a sightless eye.

And every time I remember, it takes a sense of control that I never knew I needed, to not grab him by the shoulders and shake him.

He lowers his eyes when he sees I'm staring at him.

He's somewhat ashamed that I know what's under the bandage, but I know that the reason for it isn't guilt. He doesn't feel guilt for what he's done, not an ounce of it. He's embarrassed instead, like a child would if someone were to point and laugh at him.

It just makes me even angrier.

He doesn't understand anything at all.

Selfish.

"Thank you."

Liar.

"For the notes."

I can't look at him anymore. I don't want to. Not with that pathetic expression on his face, reflected in the one eye that the spider spurned.

My chest feels hot, like if I coughed a flame would erupt.

"I'll be done with them soon."

My head, it hurts. It thrums. I can feel the pulse of blood in my temple, beating and repeating like some taunt. The pressure is unbearable.

He's turning around, and before he rights himself in his desk, he flicks his gaze on me again, and I hope, I pray that he can see the anger burning in them. He recoils a little, but stops himself before it can be more than a flinch.

His one eye is wide, shocked and the blue in it looks like darkened, well water.

He gasps and then he's turning his back on me, one hand clutching his chest and the other in the air so he can get the teacher's attention.

He excuses himself to the bathroom.

Coward.

* * *

I follow him home like a shadow. Like one of the ghosts that trail after him and he doesn't say anything about it. 

I ditched archery practice.

He knows I ditched archery practice.

And I hope it's eating away at him.

I hope he understands the exact reason why I'm behind him right now, following him like a ghost and not leaving him alone.

His shoulders are tense and his gait is stiff. His long legs scissor across the pavement, his gaze straight ahead and I can only imagine the look on his face.

I hope he's annoyed at my behavior. I hope it's driving him up the wall.

"What?" With that one word I can hear the annoyance that I've been driving at for the entire day.

I answer him to drive the point home. "I'm walking you home."

He stops walking, stops breathing, and I can see his hands fist into the pants leg of his school uniform. "Stop."

Nice try.

"Stop what?" He can't get rid of me that easily.

He spins around, glares at me, hot-blooded and breath-taking and I forget for a second that his glare is diminished by the loss of one eye.

"This." His mouth is pulled in a strict, straight line. The kind that means that I should take him seriously, that this is him not playing around, not feigning annoyance, and not flailing about in silly anger.

I hope he knows exactly how it feels to not be taken seriously, because ever since he's met me, he hasn't given me that courtesy, not once, not when it really mattered.

He can't just brush me off anymore, because I won't let him. I won't let him think that his actions don't affect me, that I'm nothing to him. Think that I won't care…

He shakes his head at me, tired and exasperated with my behavior and then he's turning around, making an effort to not let me get under his skin, under that blind eye.

"Leave me alone. Just go away and leave me alone. Don't you have Archery practice today?" His words don't have that normal spark. He just sounds tired and fed up and for some reason his words dig more, have more bite that makes the anger in me flare up like a snake. "Go, just go away." He waves his hand at me, waiting for me to leave him and my legs on their own accord walk towards and not away.

He stares at my approach, and I see the anger in him flare up too. The shock of it turns his one visible eye into a brilliant clear blue. It's piercing and I feel the focus of it shred right through my chest.

I stop right in front of him. To the point where he needs to look up at me to give me a proper glare and he hates that, I know he does. Hates the height difference and hates that I'm so close to him to begin with.

"You have a hard enough time walking with two eyes, and with one…" I let the sentence fall away, and I hope the possibility of what those words could have formed into, if I had said them will make him even angrier.

"That not your problem." He had to say it. He likes to rub it in, like antiseptic on an open wound. He'd pour salt and pepper on it if I backed away from him now.

"I guess not." I look him in the eye, narrow my own even more, and the look in my eyes, the one that's not giving him any space, that's contradicting my words, has him backing away from me. I follow his backwards motion and I continue to speak, "Never has been."

It looks like he's about to run away from me, and if he breaks into a sprint, he should know that I won't just let him get away. I'm just as fast as him, if faster, and I won't have any problem catching him. He knows that.

I'll chase after him.

He can tell me to stay put, but I won't. Never will.

"Go home." He's shaking a bit and I can tell it's from the way he's trying to control his anger.

Good.

"No."

He suddenly slaps me, as soon as the word has left my mouth. Right across the face, open handed and scalding, so the one side of my cheek stings.

His hand is still raised in the motion, and my head is still turned to the side by his slap.

He's shaking, and breathing heavily, and if he expects me to run home like some whipped dog, he's barking up the wrong tree.

He's still backing away and I catch his arm, squeeze until he's yanking and cursing at me to let him go. And then, I begin to walk in the direction of his house. I walk without looking back, pulling him behind me.

He's digging his fingernails into the skin of my wrist, his other hand is clawing at my arm and I tighten my grip around his forearm. He's really fighting me, but he won't be able to break away. Archery has toughened my fingers, made them calloused, made my grip, --the one used to pulling back the bow of stiff string and cloth to a fine degree, to the perfect angle for the shot-- impossible to break. And compared to my worn palm, his fingers are soft, even as they try to dig into my skin, his hands smooth and gentle from baking and cooking and housework.

There are two girls that I notice out of the corner of my eyesight wearing our school uniform. They watch, wide eyed and unsure what to do, and Watanuki who had noticed them much sooner than I had, looks like he wanted to explain to them…so they won't get the wrong idea.

It pisses me off even more. His incessant need to please people, to please everyone…except me.

He has the other hand that's not captured by me up in a placating gesture to the two girls and before I can stop myself, before the girls can get up the nerve to ask me what I'm doing, I glare at both of them. Enough that they turn their heads away and try to ignore Watanuki, who's still struggling to explain himself.

The grip tightens even more and he whimpers loudly. The girls most likely heard it, but I know they won't try anything, not with the promise of what a glare like that would do to them if they tried to interfere. This isn't anyone's business. It's between me and Watanuki and no one else.

He's looking back at them, longingly, still wanting badly to explain himself and this whole situation. I know how this looks; Watanuki knows how this looks to those girls, and those girls would definitely read it that way. What choice had I given them in interpreting it any other way? I hadn't given them any, because I wanted them to think that way. If Watanuki's ashamed of being seen that way with me, then I want them to spread rumors. Have the whole school talking the next day about this little fiasco. Make Watanuki suffer even more, and torment him with the fact that everyone thought that he was going out with me, that we were together.

If Himawari heard about this…it would kill him.

Let it.

At the last stretch of houses, he stopped struggling, let himself be dragged along and when I came up to the house, the one that he was renting the top portion of from some nice family, I asked him for the key to the front door. He gave it to me and I unlocked the front door.

The family wasn't home. I could hear him breath a sign of relief because of that, but really that didn't matter to me. If they had been here or not, I still would have dragged him up the stairs, just like I was doing now and opening his door and flinging him inside and locking it behind me.

"You're fucking crazy. What the hell is wrong with you?"

I lightly place his house keys on his kitchen counter. Away from him and his reach.

"I need to talk to you," I said without the hint of letting up and he eyes me like he's about to chuck me out of his window.

"Then talk to me and leave." He points at the door and his slump on the floor doesn't make the words or the motion menacing. Makes it more pleading and sad.

"Your eye"-

"Is none of your business! You hypocritical jackass!" He's up from his seat on the floor, up and in my face. "I can't believe the nerve you have. How can you talk about my decisions, when you did the exact same thing? You didn't come to me for help. You just left and…how the hell does that make me feel? It was my fault. I'm taking responsibility for it and you have no right, no right to tell me otherwise." He grabbed the keys off the counter, and was opening the door. I let him.

"Now get the hell out!" His voice cracked and he was trembling so much that the door creaked.

I took one good look at him and my hand had instantaneously made up the decision for the rest of me. I slammed the door shut with enough force to have it rattling on its hinges and him stumbling to the side.

"What the hell else was I suppose to do?" I could give a damn now about sounding calm. I'd always tried to keep that placid tenor, to not have Watanuki knowing how much he affected me, but it seemed that method had backfired on me.

He started at my words, and I could tell he was shocked by how I was talking to him.

"I can't go in Yuko's shop. I had a piece of web closing down on my eye. I freaked out a little and I wanted to go home, and at least get a good idea of what the hell was going on? That didn't give you any right to make stupid decisions on your own, you make enough of those for yourself and I sure as hell don't want you to transfer them over to me, you little idiot."

He was gaping at me now, and I didn't care if this changed things between us, because I was sick of the way he was treating me. I kicked the side of his wall angrily and it seemed to bring him out of his daze.

"You…" He choked on the word and turned away from me so fast that his shoes squeaked on the floor. I followed after him as he tried to escape around his counter and into his kitchen. He went for the window over the sink and opened it; thankfully for some much needed air.

He bit his lip when he turned back around to face me, and said in a much smaller voice than I'd expected to come out from the likes of him, "It was my decision to make."

His arms were bracing against the sink as he faced me and I moved closer to him. "Then…it was my decision too." My voice had gone back to the normal volume. "Back then when I had pulled apart that spider's web to get your hand free…that was my decision." I had his attention and I moved past my barriers because I wanted to keep that attention. "Back when you were getting sick, when you were visiting that…lady…I killed her, without a second thought. That was my decision too and I didn't care if you hated me for it, because that was _my_ decision." He gasped and I could guess that he was reliving the memory of my arrow piercing into the woman he had most likely looked up to as a mother figure. "Back then, when that girl had attacked you with a knife, it was my decision to grab it before it struck you." He was shaking his head now, as if trying to deny that any of those things had happened, and I moved to put my hands on his shoulders to steady him. My voice cracked with strange desperation, "Back then, when I dug through the ground for you, when I held onto Himawari's thin ribbon and prayed that you hadn't died, that you would come back, and waited in the rain for ten agonizing hours," I shook him a little. I couldn't help it. Something was shaking inside of me, trembling like a leaf in the wind, even when my hands were steady and firm on his shoulders. "My decision."

I breathed out and his eye on me was scared and sad looking. "And that day that I had held onto your hand and hadn't let go, that first day that was going to be one of many…with you…was my decision. All of it."

Tears were running down his face without the accompanying sounds, and the pure silence of his pain made it even sadder to witness. "Watanuki." I had to swallow the answering lump in my throat to his tears, "Please, you might not respect me, but please, respect my feelings for you."

Watanuki pushed passed me then, walking clumsily toward his bed and where he kept a box of paper tissues. He fell on his cot, tore off his glasses, and had started yanking out tissues, and it was then that I heard it; the muffled sobs of someone who didn't want anyone to hear him crying, crying so desperately.

I couldn't help but walk toward him. Couldn't help but sit down next to him and pry his hands away from his wet face. Watch him fist them in my hands and struggle to pull them back to where they had been. He hiccupped and sniffling with embarrassment, he had suddenly thrown himself towards me and buried his face in my chest. I let him cry all over my shirt, crushed up against my chest with one of my arms around his shoulders and the other on his head, trying awkwardly to pat his hair.

He cried, and cried, and I started to worry that it would never stop, not when every time it seemed it would, he would sniff and start back all over again. I thought that maybe I had broken something within him that kept the tears at bay, that kept Watanuki strong enough to keep all his sadness and his wants for a normal life and all his hardships under his control. The sobs had gradually died down and holding a broken Watanuki in my arms had made me feel somehow stronger. Another decision was forming in my head, the decision to not make him cry again, because it was loud and messy and made me feel like shit.

He hugged me tighter before peeking up from under his eyes and my shirt. He backed away, but he was still holding onto my arms that were around the small of his back.

"I need to lie down." His voice was weary with anguish and he was suddenly leaning back in my arms. I shifted so that I could lay him down on his back. He closed his eyes and with my arms trapped under him, I hovered over him, waiting for some kind of sign that everything was going to all right.

He sighed. Arched up so that I could remove my hands from under his back and it occurred to me then that I was practically on top of him, and that I was getting hard from that realization. He was still arched up, waiting for me to slip my arms from under him and then when he felt that I wasn't doing what he'd expected, was actually clutching his lower back, he arched up even further as if trying to get away from the touch.

I didn't let him get very far away because suddenly my mouth was on him, pressing him back into the mattress and I was climbing completely on top of him. He sucked in his breath, and I pushed my tongue into his mouth when his lips tried to get more air into his lungs.

It occurred to me that Watanuki might not like me that way, of course, that I was stealing a kiss from him that had most likely been promised to Himawari. Watanuki was more than none, revolted by my behavior and he had every right to be and I knew that I should stop, pull away, leave him alone to mourn his lost control and other things, but…

I got my tongue in his mouth and my erection throbbed painfully. This wasn't too much of a surprise really, not when I'd already had my fair share of wet dreams about him. About what it would be like to finally shut him up and kiss him, or occupy his mouth with something else…

I liked Watanuki a lot, had for some time and it made the perverse pressure between my legs harden further when I settled my weight on the smaller boy. Pressed the head of my cock against his thigh and tried not to come all over myself when he'd lifted up those long legs and wrapped one around my back. Watanuki was kissing me back, open-mouthed and heated, his hands were suddenly passing through my hair, his fingers trying to find a purchase in the short crop of my hair and failing miserably. They clung to my neck and shoulders instead and I couldn't help but buck into his arms, right between his legs, rubbing myself roughly against his thighs.

It felt too good, and before I knew it, my shirt was off and I was unzipping my pants and at the same time trying to undress Watanuki. He was still kissing me, deep and soulful kisses, that for all there clumsiness and jitters of the first time, was still making my knees weak and my erection ache. I'd ripped his pants off and didn't even bother with his shirt when the first contact of the soft skin of his thigh contacted with the bared head of my erection. I groaned, grabbed his legs, hauled them up and instinct was overriding the fact that this was my first time with anyone, and that my first time was going to be with a guy.

For some reason, it wasn't bothering me as much as I thought it would. Which was a big indicator because if all the clues were pointing to what I'd guessed a few months ago, that'd I had been slowly falling in love then this would be the last person too.

Watanuki could be difficult in everything else, but in bed, it seemed he wanted it just as much as me because he didn't even wait for me to try and find something to prep him with. He just moaned, something so enthralling that it made my beating heart squeeze in my chest and my cock leak. His skinny arms around my neck had pulled and shifted me until the head of my penis was pressing into his anus. Then without warning, using both of his legs he had squeezed me down on top of him and I was inside, stupid with surprise and lust and I couldn't stop leaking and bucking my hips.

He was biting down on his lip, his back completely arched and his stomach and his own erection pressing into my abdominal muscles, his shirt slipping off one shoulder and the material warmly brushing my chest at the motions of his labored breathing. He was in pain, had to be if he had just done something so stupid and nice…and it didn't matter anymore because Watanuki had hooked his legs around my waist and with the muscles in his thighs--the ones that I liked to watch flex during soccer matches--was moving my hips, and causing friction against my penis and his erection against my stomach. He shivered, and I forgot my hesitation and pushed back into him, as deep as I could go, and it was just so easy. The thought that making love to Watanuki was so damn easy and felt so good spurning me into pulling back out and slamming back in with a grunt. He was moaning around my shoulders and I could smell the powdered sugar on his hands, on his lips--probably from taste-testing the cake he had baked today in Home Ec. The one that I had eaten all by myself and hadn't left a piece for the rest of the class to try--and it was getting me harder. He was moving his hips, meeting my thrusts and with every huff of his breath I could still smell the powdered sugar. The cinnamon and nutmeg and flour and it was all mixed up with the sugar and I had to kiss him, get that taste in his mouth, before I came, because it was all suddenly very important. He let me kiss him, let me suck his tongue and bruise the soft underside of his knees as I gripped it helplessly and pounded into him.

It took all of a minute and I came fiercely inside of him, he shrieked at the feel of it and then he was coming, right against my stomach and I pressed my body down on top of him so that it would help with the shivers wracking his body.

"Doumekiii…," he'd purred my name and I was tucking my head under his chin and breathing in the scent there and snuggling into the motions of his throat as it worked and swallowed air into his lungs. He shifted under me, a motion that caused the sensitive skin of my penis to brush against the loosening muscles of his body and I had gripped his hips and slowly pulled out, had to, because I could slowly feel the stirrings of arousal lapping at my body again. He moaned at the feel of it and I watched half drugged on my ego as I slipped out of him.

Breathing was the first order of business and after a couple minutes of careful breaths and rest, I had grabbed my pants and started to pull them on. He was still lying down when I was buttoning on my shirt and it didn't look like he was moving from that spot anytime soon. He curled himself on his side and I glanced at his alarm clock, saw that it was an hour past and that in an hour's time, my life had changed and in all the best of ways.

Watanuki's breathing was leveled out and I couldn't figure out if he was sleeping, until he turned his head to look back at me and simply thrown my way, like he was giving me my lunch or asking me to borrow a pencil.

"I want my eye back."

_Get angry and teach him. Because right now he has no idea how much he's hurting you._

And suddenly with those five, small words tucked away in my chest, the world seemed a much brighter place.

**

* * *

A/N:** Holy cow. Okay well, I hope somebody liked this out there and that Doumeki wasn't too OCC, or Watanuki. Reviews are much appreciated. 


	2. All the Wonders of the World

**A/N:** This chapter is just some wild speculation on my part, since I am in no way CLAMP, or come near to their story telling genius! This is the day after chapter one, and Doumeki is reminescing, or something like that.

Also someone pleaseclear this up for me. Watanuki is his last name right? Because they always place Kimihiro at the front and with that whole Meiji-westernization thing, Japanese people now place given names before and family names after. Plus the fortune teller lady had said Watanuki's mother had given him(Kimihiro) this name. This also goes for Domeki right? His first name is Shizuka, right? Because Watanuki doesn't add honorifics when he calls him Domeki. I would really appreciate an answer to my stupid question.

* * *

At some point in time, I don't know when, but Watanuki had been given the title of "One of the Seven Wonders" of Cross Private. 

At the time, I didn't understand what they were alluding to. I had known of Watanuki as just a fellow classmate, who was a good athlete, whose cooking skills were exceptional from the average high-schooler as noticed by our Home Economics teacher, and who had, as everyone in his vicinity put it, a serious, one-sided crush on Kunogi of class 2A.

Those were the things I knew about Watanuki, and from that, it was still baffling to me, why everyone called him a wonder. To me, he seemed pretty commonplace, if a little mental, when it came to Kunogi and the way he fawned over her and shrieked at me anytime I had any business with her.

To me he was just a guy with a crush, albeit an obsessive crush. I guess there was nothing unusual about that, nothing that warranted the nickname and some people's avoidance of him.

I was starting to think that the kids at my school were just making an excuse to ostracize Watanuki.

That was, until the day I was coming back from archery practice, and I ran across him in the middle of the road, screaming and flailing about. Even at one point, flat on his stomach on the ground, looking for all the world like something was crushing him. I hadn't come from behind the corner to help him, because quite frankly, his behavior disturbed me. No one else had been in the area at that time; it had just been me and a thrashing Watanuki, rolling on the ground and squealing like he was on fire.

I'd left with that image in my head, and that night, in my bedroom my mind kept going back to the sight of Watanuki. There was something so distressing in the way Watanuki had appeared, something that kept me from dropping the subject and just going along with the whole school in calling him a nutbar.

There had to be a reason for his behavior…well other than him being a psychopath. So the next day, when I'd come back from school and was having dinner with my grandfather, out of the blue, I'd asked him what he thought would make someone lie on his stomach in the middle of the road and scream.

My grandfather stopped eating, put his chopsticks down, and then asked me what brought this question on. I shrugged my shoulders.

He didn't ask anymore questions, just told me it was…maybe due to stress, mental breakdowns were common among high school students sadly, especially during exams. He asked me if he wasn't being too presumptuous to assume that this was someone from my school. I nodded my head.

"Do you know this student?"

"Sort of."

"Then what do you think? Do you believe it is a mental breakdown?"

I didn't have much proof to say otherwise, but there was this feeling in my gut that told me that wasn't the case here. I thought Watanuki was kind of loopy, on account of his behavior toward me--he pitched one hell of a fit any time I walked into a room, made snide comments behind my back, and tried to trip me during soccer matches--but that was loopy and not plain out penitentiary-insane.

"No." There was this feeling, when I watched Watanuki roll around on the ground and screaming obscenities, that he wasn't alone. Like there was something else there with him. I don't know why I felt this way but…

I groped for the words to explain this to my grandfather without sounding like a complete nutbar myself. "I thought…maybe he was being…" possessed. Manipulated by the ghosts my grandfather always talked about in his spare time. Grandfather had always said there was a world outside of this one, where unfathomable creatures lay in waiting, watching us and bidding their time until they could use the darkness within our hearts to attack. I believed those stories because they had come from my Grandfather, because I knew he was a kind and honest man, and that I was only a child, alive for so short a time compared to him, and that I'd never seen everything in this world worth seeing.

"Possessed?"

My Grandfather closed his eyes. "Is that what you think? It could be something else, something more ordinary…"

Grandfather might be a monk, but he was also a man, a man who wasn't too caught up in the spiritual world where he couldn't see the real world as well. I respected him for that.

"What is this boy's name?"

"Kimihiro Watanuki." My grandfather had served many people in the community; I hoped he would know something about them too.

"Watanuki!" I guess he did know. I'd never seen a name startle my Grandfather.

"Doumeki, how do you know this boy?" He sounded a bit worried. What was going on?

"In school, he's not in any of my classes really, but we see each other sometimes." I replied easily, and my Grandfather had fastened his black eyes on me.

"That boy…there is a horrible curse that follows that family. A while ago, I…had been called upon for an exorcism, nothing that a priest like myself couldn't handle, it was quite easy, and probably the easiest one I'd ever done. The couple that had hired me was very nice, kind, and I was invited to stay for dinner. They had a little boy, just as kind as his parents. I'd had dinner with them," There was now a small smile on my Grandfather's face, "It was the best meal I'd ever had, more sufficient in payment than if all the gold in the world had been dumped in my lap." The smile vanished. "I was quite proud of that exorcism, but imagine my shock when the very next day I was called upon again by the same family. The Spirits, they had come back, but instead of the simple haunting they had done previous, they were now centering themselves in a specific room."

Grandfather took a breath, and I couldn't help but hold my breath in return.

"The room of the child. They were relentless, so fierce and bloodthirsty. It was having no doubt an effect on the child, he was getting weaker and sicker by the day, and it was unbearable to carry out vigils and witness those kind people suffer so much."

He shook his head with a sigh. "I have never run across such an intense aura in all my life. I could do nothing, but watch, and wait for them to leave. Maybe a month after, when the boy was still recuperating, his parents, both of them, out of nowhere, had contracted sickness and…died."

Watanuki didn't have parents?

"To have died so young and to have left such a young boy to fend for himself. It was painful to have to conduct the funeral. I will never forget that day, all rainy skies and mourning in the air. I remember the child very well. He had not cried. Possibly because he had shed so many tears already. I remember watching him sit perfectly still, and watching the caskets solemnly."

He took another large steadying breath, "I had my eyes on him for the entire reception, and so it wasn't by accident that I saw something."

Something?

"Ghosts. Things that looked human…and things that did not resemble human form anymore. They were right behind him, circling him, making a mockery of the processions. The sad part about it…the truly heartbreaking thing was that he knew…that boy knew they were there and he didn't say anything. He just trembled and kept quiet."

_Watanuki._

"I approached the family that had took him in, but they didn't want anything to do with me. They thought what I did was foolish. I do not blame them for wanting me to not bother the boy, he had gone through so much, so I had left."

I watched my Grandfather now, as he's lost in his past, and maybe his regrets that he could not help Watanuki. I want to help; I want to do something…for my Grandfather, and for Watanuki.

I didn't say anything; I didn't have anything to say. What could I have said to that? Nothing, so I had left the dinner table when I was finished, and tried to fall asleep without much success.

It was probably a week after that Watanuki approached me with a request to use my home as the site for the telling of A Hundred Ghost Stories. And then from there it all went downhill.

It's now, after months of talking and witnessing his pain that I finally and truly understand the meaning behind the title Watanuki has been given. Now I think the title "One of the Seven Wonders" isn't enough to describe how utterly amazing he is. How strong and spirited he is. What confuses me now though, is the fact that he's just _one_ of the seven wonders and not _all_ of them. There's nothing as interesting as him in school, and there will never be anything that could be more surprising.

He's the only person in the world that can keep you constantly on your toes, without pulling a gun on you.

Like now for instance:

"What the hell do you mean there's rumors?" He flails to the left, shimmies to the right, and then flails some more.

"Bastard!" He points at me. "What have you done?"

I shrug and he spazzes out like he's having a seizure.

To defend myself, I didn't know the rumor would spread…this fast. Yesterday hadn't been one of my best days; if anything it had been my worse. I'd practically just lost it, but I had good reasons. Very good reasons. That reason was now standing in front of me and cursing me out.

"Ho, ho. Look fighting like a married couple this early in the morning. Man you guys have got it bad." I recognized the boy from my class who just said this, and Watanuki, zooming in on him like a missile, threw one hand out and stopped him from going any further.

"What did you just say? I must not have heard you…because," Watanuki put his hand to his ear, insisting that this boy couldn't have possibly said what he thought he heard, "…you wouldn't say something like that." He grabbed the boy by the lapels of his uniform and then began to shake him like a rag doll. "It's not true! It's not true!"

There was a crowd, now gathering around the spectacle of Watanuki assaulting his fellow classmate. He was trying desperately to convince this boy, and the steadily growing crowd, that he in no way had anything to do with me, and that these rumors were just that, rumors.

Watanuki, when he saw that the boy wasn't paying attention to his shouts anymore, so much as clutching his stomach and looking like he wanted to hurl, Watanuki flung him without any disregard to the side.

He turned to the crowd. "This is all some big misunderstanding."

I can't blame him for being this way. It's just how he is. His need to please people and look a certain way in their eyes, it was intrinsic to his personality. It was the very reason why he had survived all these long hard years, hiding his secrets, never giving in for a second and blabbing to everyone. He was the kind of person that didn't see this as a right to brag that he was special, no; he just wanted to be normal. Wanted normal things, wanted a normal life.

I respect him for that.

"And you," He was now pointing at me, "Get that stupid look off your face!" He threw his arms up in the air, "But I know that's not possible. You'd have to peel off your face for it to stop being stupid."

And there was no way that this wasn't love, if I could take all his disrespectable snips without punching him in the one remaining eye he had.

He'd walked off then, making more noise than a train on bumpy tracks and one of the teachers, who had been sitting quietly in her classroom, had slid the door open and peered out to see if one of her students was being horribly murdered, because those sounds couldn't be coming from anyone else but a stab victim.

**

* * *

A/N:** I plan to have more short chapters, just like this once...maybe even shorter. It's just fun to mess around with these characters. Oh and I, probably like many people here, believe without a doubt that the supposed accident that Watanuki's parents die in, isn't an accident. Bum, bum, bummmm. Probably got killed off by some ghost or something. Reviews are appreciated and eaten and stored away in my stomach, because I am a review monster: (Weak sounding) Rawww... 


	3. Extracurricular Activities

**A/N:** I like portraying the eviler side of Domeki. I mean we get glimpses of it in the manga whenever he teases Watanuki. But I'd like to see this side as it goes through changes, especially in the Spider's arc. Domeki isn't just a flat character. He has wants, and needs, and thoughts that move him to doing actions. Okay, enough with my spiel. Hope somebody likes this.

* * *

First period started off with Watanuki bellowing in my ear that I still hadn't wiped that idiotic expression off my face. So, in enlightenment of why this was, I whispered to him, right in front of the entire class that it was because sex could do that to a guy. Then I watched him go batshit and try to knock me out with his book satchel. 

It was fun.

Teasing Watanuki was always fun, so much fun that once I'd thought of putting it under extra curricular activities, right next to Archery club when I'd had to fill out a club sheet.

But then I thought hastily that if everyone found out, and they saw how much fun it was, they might want to join too. That wasn't right. I was the only club member, and as long as I was breathing, it would remain that way.

I was a special, privileged member of the Watanuki club. Number one fan, really.

He was taking notes again. I knew I should at least try to look like I was paying attention, but he was shuffling his feet under his desk, and I couldn't help but pay more attention to his legs than the teacher.

I'd come to a conclusion after two minutes of staring that I liked Watanuki's legs. Really liked them. Even if this conclusion had been reached the night before when they had been wrapped around me, squeezing my hipbone.

Watanuki had the longest, skinniest legs I'd ever seen and I liked watching them move, especially when he wore shorts during track.

I nudged one of his legs under his desk. When I wasn't getting the response I'd hoped for, I nudged him again, right on the calf; wished the cloth of his pants, and my shoe and socks weren't in the way when I touched him again.

"Stop it." He said it without turning around.

I did it again.

"Stop it, you"-

Pervert. Say it. Say it, so everyone can hear.

"Asshole."

I nudged his leg again. This time harder, "You never say what you're really thinking, do you?"

That comment made me sound suspiciously like a hypocrite.

Oh well.

"Stop it, or I'm not giving you your lunch." Watanuki had still not turned around to glare at me, just kept forward and moved his pencil to make it look like he was taking notes.

Some of the desks in our class had this great feature; the lower back of it had a cut out circle and currently sitting in one of these desks was Watanuki. And so, when my hand reached out under my desk, I didn't have any obstacles in the way of my fingers, as they found the soft material of Watanuki's uniform.

My eyes were straight ahead, and I saw plain as day, the flinch that my touch caused in him. He kept perfectly still after that, which was fine by me, since I was too busy groping him under his uniform shirt to worry about if he liked it or not.

His lower back was soft, the skin there warmed by cotton and his pervious frolicking about in the hallway. I was getting hard, and I knew if I didn't stop touching him somebody was going to notice. Didn't mean I had to stop right away. There were more important things than lunch hanging in the balance. Don't get me wrong, I still wanted my bento, but…

I ran my hand up the curve of his lower back and his frame visibly shivered at the touch.

I noticed somebody whispering to the side of me and turning in that direction, I came upon a giggling girl, who had noticed the motions of my hand.

I had to pull away then. I retracted my hand putting it back innocently on top of my desk, so it could join the other.

No one said anything. Watanuki had stopped taking notes. He was just sitting there breathing and I would have paid anything to see the blush on his face, because I knew it was there.

**

* * *

A/N:** Thanks to all that liked the story so far, again I'm just goofing around with the characters. In school, at home…or in Yuko's shop because crap that's another dimension. Pay no heed to my inaccuracies. I'm doing them on purpose, or maybe not. Reviews much appreciated 


	4. Lunch Choices

**A/N:** I'm a pervert...hehehehe.

* * *

"Where's my bento?" I put my hand out, the same one that had been feeling up under his clothes this morning. Had it palm flat, closing and opening and waiting for my bento. It didn't escape Watanuki how my hand looked as it closed and opened slowly, how it seemed like I was caressing the air. 

He tried to kick me in the shin and then, when that didn't work out; he turned his back on me. But then--I can only guess--he remembered what I'd done to him this morning, when his back had been helplessly turned to me, because suddenly he was turning back around and handing me my bento with a curse and another attempted kick. He missed.

I ate it with the same relish that I scarfed down any of his handmade lunches.

I noticed that he was looking around anxiously. I didn't have to guess who he was looking for.

"Late lunch, remember?"

He turned to me and then sighed quietly. "Yes, yes. I wish Himawari were here today."

Himawari was a nice girl. I liked her like Watanuki, but not nearly as insanely as he did. I don't think anyone liked any human being with as much zeal as he put in for Himawari.

For some reason that thought made me feel kind of…not hungry.

That was a first.

"You don't like it?" Watanuki, chopsticks in hand was picking at his lunch, looking like he wasn't all that hungry himself.

"That's a dumb question." Watanuki could probably make poison taste good.

"Uh, just shut up and eat your food." His voice whined a little and it was kind of strange to hear him take that tone with me, considering what he'd just said. Usually when he asked me to do something, his tone was more belligerent.

I continued to stare at my bento. It did look really appetizing and I did want to eat it.

"I've never seen you admire my food before." Watanuki said, around the straw in his mouth as he drank a boxed drink.

It wasn't the only thing I was admiring, because it had come to my attention that Watanuki looked appetizing too, even more so than his lunch.

Food and Watanuki.

I knew there was a way of combining these two things together in order to satisfy my newly acquired taste.

Watanuki, huffing because he thought I was purposefully ignoring him said irritated, "What is your problem today? You're more annoying than unusual."

I continued to let him think I was ignoring him, so I could contemplate how I would get my two favorite things to somehow turn into another, newer, but many times more favorite thing.

I spied some brownies located conveniently next to his bento cover.

He was now putting his bento to the side, along with his chopsticks. "I don't think I have too much of an appetite today." He said, which registered as another strange development from the boy sitting next to me. The words not angrily shouted at me, but said calmly and seriously.

Things were looking up.

He went for the brownies.

Things were really looking up.

He offered some out to me calmly and I took one. I hadn't immediately shoved it into my mouth, because I was distracted as he picked one up and took a small bite.

He had crumbs around his mouth and the chocolate icing had smudged onto his fingers.

I suddenly had my appetite back.

Especially when he started licking one of his fingers, the images from the night before and what that tongue could do running through my head and making me unconsciously squish the brownie in my hand.

"Watanuki." He looked up at the sound of my flat voice and then, he was furrowing his brow and squinting at me through his one eye. No doubt, now noticing the look in my eyes and at the same time trying to make sure before he jumped to conclusions about what such a look meant when aimed at him.

I grabbed him by the arm, pulled him into the lap and went straight for the crumbs doting the side of his mouth. He huffed, struggled a little and then he was letting me kiss him there. It was nice, and it was even nicer when he scooted forward and let me press more kisses to the side of his face.

He kissed me once, right on the cheek because my mouth was preoccupied with the corners of his mouth, still licking and tasting the crumbs there. His hands weren't on me, were more in the air, right next to my head. Small traces of icing were still on his fingers, and I didn't have to guess why he wasn't touching me. He was just weird like that, and wouldn't touch me until his hands were clean.

I was more than happy to help him out there.

I'd went for one finger, licked it inside my mouth and then was sucking on it as he gaped at me and told me quite frankly that he'd rather use soap and water.

He was right on top of me, sitting right on top of my straining erection and I couldn't suppress a shiver as he moved without knowing against it.

I knew I should be more careful. We were sitting on the roof and I had locked the door behind me, because right from the start, I'd had ulterior motives for our lunch. Making out in school wasn't the smartest decision I'd ever made in my life, but it was by far the nicest.

"Mmmhh…Doumeki, stop before someone sees us."

I answered back while running the edge of my teeth on one of his knuckles, "We're on the roof."

"So?"

I was lapping at the soft side of his palm and he involuntarily hissed.

I responded naturally, "Unless the teachers can fly then I don't think we have anything to worry about." He pushed at my shoulder and getting my hands on his hips I shifted him hard on my cock.

He made a startled sound. "Dammit, just behave alright."

I shifted him again and he felt it as it brushed against his thigh. He blushed and sputtered that this wasn't the place for _that!_

I couldn't help but ask him teasingly--but actually seriously--where the place for _that_ was, and if in the future, I were at this place, would I be guaranteed sex.

He sputtered and blushed some more.

Cute came to mind and I liked the sound of it.

Cute Watanuki.

"We can't. Crap, why are you so"- He blushed cherry red.

Without a beat or embarrassment, I finished the sentence for him. "Hard." I looked down between us and he was pulling away from me, or trying to.

"It's because you're on top of me." I said matter-of-factly, which I knew drove him nuts.

"It's your fault. I'm just…" he was unconsciously rubbing my arm, nice and slow and--it didn't seem like he was the being one being driven insane anymore--the motion of it making me get harder and driving me nuts.

He let the sentence drop and just continued to touch my arm and hold onto it.

And I knew if he didn't stop, he was going to have a new perspective on life when I pushed him on his back.

We were kissing before I could get my head out of the clouds, his mouth soft and hot, and the sound of his labored breathing making me break away and try to push him on his back.

He puts his other hand on my arm as he struggled to keep himself in an upright position.

"We can't. C'mon, use some common sense, you idiot."

I tumbled him backwards and leaning over him, I finally got my mouth on his throat, breathing words there that I know he'd be able to hear, even if they aren't clear shoved up against his neck.

"It feels good."

His hands were in my hair; petting me and making the tendons in my neck lock up from every soft touch.

"It won't take long." Not with the way I was worked up. "And you feel so"-

The bell rang.

Right when I had opened my mouth to suck on his throat.

We lay there, for a while breathing, with Watanuki looking up at the blue sky and me looking down at this throat. I figured maybe it wouldn't have been a good idea if I'd gotten my way, because coming all over my pants and still having to go to class didn't sound like much fun.

Even still, I smothered whatever groans of protest I had as Watanuki pushed at my shoulder. He stood up, dusted off his clothing and was then picking up our bentoes and growling at me to, "Get up."

We were both late for class and when we walked in, even the teacher was giving us strange looks.


	5. Girlfriend?

**A/N:** Thank you so much for all the wonderful reviews. It's really nice to know what you guys like: Supply closets that lock from the inside, feet kicking under the table and Double Hot Fudge Cake—Dear god I just got a mental picture of what these things combined would look like—and then what you don't like: Interruptive school bells.

* * *

I'd thought about ditching archery practice again, but Watanuki had said he was going to Yuko's today. I asked him if he could ditch out on Yuko-san too, so we could start looking for a remedy. My Grandfather did have plenty of source material on the occult and it _would_ give me an excuse to take Watanuki into a dark, cramped room with a sturdy desk and a door that locked from the inside. 

Unfortunately, Watanuki had gotten such a spooked look on his face by the mere suggestion of leaving that woman alone in a house full of alcohol and no supervision, that I'd immediately dropped the idea and told him as penance, he would have to make it up to me tomorrow. I let him think it was up to him to decide.

But when he wasn't looking, I'd slipped a note in his satchel with a list of what I expected of him.

I thought if anything, it would be completely worth the loudness tomorrow to see the expression on his face after he read my note.

And that one thought had followed me through the locker room and out into the practice range. The team was getting their bows ready and as I made my way over to them, I let the smirk drop from my face. They didn't need to see it. I reserved that expression for Watanuki, and Watanuki alone, despite his abhorrent hate for it.

I found myself an empty bench and deciding now would be a good time, I set down my boxed lunch on my lap and began to eat. I was ravenous by this time, due to me skipping out on lunch and choosing instead to make out with Watanuki on the rooftop. Watanuki had been thoughtful enough to give me his boxed lunch as well, and the brownies he'd baked.

I was moving onto Watanuki's bento by the time my teammates started to notice what I was doing and shoving a whole riceball into my mouth—I had to make it quick, my coach was starting to notice too—I inhaled the thermos of luke warm tea that Watanuki also had the foresight to give me.

My teammates on principle, looked absolutely horrified.

I don't know why. Obviously they'd never taste Watanuki's cooking before.

"Hungry Domeki-kun?" One of my teammates patted my back, as if he assumed I was choking on my already swallowed riceball.

Another teammate asked me suddenly, which two girls had given me the bento boxes, and another teammate catching sight of the brownies, tacked on one more girl, because those brownies just looked too delicious for there to not be a third lovely girl.

"Three girls in all Domeki. Damn you making a killing."

I looked at them strangely, and started on my brownies.

Another teammate, who wasn't an upperclassman and was in my first period, catching my expression said, "Oh, hey were those made by Watanuki?"

"Watanuki? Whose that, your girlfriend?"

Heh.

"Damn at least save me one. That looks really good."

I was already chewing the last piece of brownie into my mouth, and the sound of mourning offered up for the lost brownie was heard throughout the team.

"You ate four of those."

Yeah, well.

The coach, catching the conversation and feeling magnanimous walked over, instead of shouting for the team to line up, which I appreciated. At least it gave me some time to digest my food.

He was also now patting me on the back heartily and I wondered why everyone was doing that today. I guess he thought I was more easily approachable now that I had myself a "girlfriend." People on the team were nice enough, but they never really sought me out, mostly because I could understand how difficult it was to carry a conversation with me. Or maybe it had more to do with the fact that every time I arrived on the range, I would head straight for practice and not even stop to socialize. It wasn't my thing and since I was just sitting here eating, some of the guys probably thought it was a chance to bond a little. Or then again, maybe it had more to do with the rumor about me hooking up with someone. It could be that it was a combination of all three reasons. I didn't really know and truthfully, I didn't really care.

My classmate, who didn't seem to want to drop the subject of Watanuki turned to the others and said, "Watanuki's a guy." My teammates were all instantly "ohhing" and "ahhing" over the fact that a guy could cook. They all probably only knew how to make microwavable ramen, which was regrettably my forte too.

"He's always making snacks for you, isn't he?" That same classmate pressed and I could guess that he was trying to figure out if the rumors about Watanuki and me were true.

"Yeah." I blinked at him and then was up from my seat, fixing my glove and preparing my bow to start practice.

I heard some of the guys still talking about my good fortune with home cooking, but it was soon short lived, as shouts from the coach to line up broke through the practice range.


	6. Saints Come in Unlikely Forms

**A/n:** I usually write fics in third person, so this is me going back to my safe, square comfort zone. Although for some reason, this chapter gave me some trouble. I guess _muse Doumeki_ just wants center stage. Geez, who'd have known he was such an attention hog. And he still gets center stage since I focused only on his thoughts. Although I don't think those things are going to matter much when you read the first sentence. Hehehehe:)

* * *

He was currently _not_ looking up ways to cure Watanuki of the curse, but somehow pining him up against his bedroom wall and fucking him. 

This morning he had woken up early enough, went to the storage area, collected the books he thought he could carry on account of the others being old, and fragile, and expensive and irreplaceable and arrived at Watanuki's with a prompt knock and an empty stomach.

It still didn't explain how he was in this current position with Watanuki, but he was getting to that.

Watanuki had let him in and they'd walked up the stairs quietly because the family was still sleeping. Watanuki had taken some of his load away and was going through it with a flipping gaze. Hmming' here and there and chucking books at his head, because this one didn't have the answer in it and "how the hell were they supposed to find his exact curse and the exact method in which to cure it, when they couldn't even find anything about spiders…and what the hell…is this the prequel to the Kama Sutra!"

He knew Watanuki was just getting on his case because the boy still felt validated for his choice. Even though he had agreed to help out, it didn't mean he was going to be optimistic about it, and believe him when he said Watanuki was being far from optimistic.

"It just seems impossible," he'd said, as he flipped the book sideways and tried to examine a picture that looked quite innocuous right side up, but sideways looked inappropriately like something else.

"You nasty pervert. Why did you bring this book in here?" Now Watanuki was flinging the supposed precursor to the Kama Sutra at his head, and when he had gotten a look at the picture, it didn't seem all that bad too him. "And why did you give me that note? What's wrong with you?" Watanuki hissed under his breath at him like a cat.

Watanuki suddenly had the note in question in his hands and had slammed it down on the table in front of them. "Seriously, I want to know what the hell is wrong with you?" Watanuki questioned, looking disturbed and curious at the same time.

"Read me what you can't do then." He said, because his list seemed simple enough.

Watanuki blushed and was then sputtering and crinkling the note in his hands even more.

"Everything!"

"Well give me some examples." He asked again, which made Watanuki flush up to his forehead. He took the note from the boy and looking it over read them out loud.

"Number one. Bake a cake…I don't see what's wrong with this one?" He said plainly, which he knew drove Watanuki nuts.

"Oh and the whole 'put lots of whip cream on it' doesn't factor in, does it?"

He cut Watanuki off and watched the boy twist his fists in his hair, "Number two. Don't wear any underwear." He said without a trace of embarrassment and Watanuki looked at him like he'd lost his mind.

"Are you serious?" Watanuki said, shaking his head and putting a hand up to his forehead.

"Well, _are_ you wearing any underwear?" He asked to make it clear that he was.

Watanuki was so flabbergasted that he hadn't answered back, which was fine with him since he was moving on.

"Number three. Sex." Well, it only made sense that he'd put this down, since his previous request had asked for no underwear."

Watanuki was still staring at him liked he'd lost his mind. "I can't believe people don't see the…type of person you really are. If they only knew…"

"Number four. Have sex with Doumeki." He blatantly said, because he had to make it extremely clear, or Watanuki might try to get out on a default. He'd even made room for a signed signature.

Right now in the space, in Watanuki's handwriting, the boy had scribbled across in angry kanji, _"Fuck you!"_ Which to him was kind of like consent.

Watanuki had snatched the note from his hands, ripped it into tiny, possibly microscopic pieces and then stepped on it for emphasis.

"My answer." He said smugly.

Well…he could wait if Watanuki was going to be such a prick about it.

He handed the smaller boy another book to look through, which resulted in them a minute later squabbling about these books sucking and what do you mean, "Feed me."

"Can you wait a minute?" Watanuki had said, getting up from his cushion and walking over to his futon. Doumeki, rising from his seat as well, walked over and sat down against the wall facing Watanuki's futon. He made himself comfortable.

Watanuki was folding his sheets, the motions of his hands elegant, even when he appointed himself with such a mundane task. The other boy could be completely awkward most of the time, but when he wasn't being a spaz, when he wasn't being self-conscious, and loud, and instead focusing on a task, Doumeki had always found the boy's motions elegant, cordial even.

His long limbs carrying a natural grace that made him a sight to behold, even when he was folding sheets. His quietness adding even more to the beauty of the picture and making Doumeki wonder if Watanuki had any idea how attractive he was.

Girls noticed Watanuki. Although he seemed to attract the…stranger ones—and he meant that in the nicest possibly way—since Kunogi was friends with Watanuki. She hadn't been scared off by his intense personality, which had to say a lot about the girl's strength of character or her…denseness. He wasn't sure which, since Kunogi was the only person other than Watanuki that he couldn't read. Well…her _and_ Yuko-san, although he didn't think the older woman counted, as she seemed to be one of those universal mysteries that didn't have one definite, true answer to them.

Which brought him back to his opinion that Watanuki was always surrounded by the most…interesting—and he meant that in the nicest way possibly—women he had ever come across.

The Zashiki Warashi was definitely not your run of the mill girl meets boy crush. She had definitely dispelled any type of normalness with that first impression and what an impression it had been, although her crush on Watanuki had made it so easy to see the girl behind all that magic and mysticism.

The fact that a spirit revered for its pureness had been caught by Watanuki's veiled charms, his beauty, his concealed moments of delicate grace and his kind words just further proved his point. That Watanuki, even though he was the spaz of the century, had the strangest way of drawing people towards him and keeping them there.

He didn't think he was stating an opinion when he called Watanuki beautiful.

He was just…a beautiful person.

Which brought him to yet another point that had been coagulating in his brain for as long as he'd known the other boy.

Why were ghosts so attracted to Watanuki's mere presence, that they would claw over their graves, over each other and nasty retribution just to touch him, to slither over him, to pull at him and hold him down?

Was it just the blood flowing through his veins?

Or was it something more? His parents had never been haunted like this. His grandfather had even said that when the haunting was happening in Watanuki's house, it had been solely focused on him.

So then why was it just Watanuki? What was it that made Watanuki so irresistible that ghosts would face Yuko-san just to get to him? That they would even face him, with his own spiritual powers, his own blood like salt and vinegar on their fathom wounds and Watanuki's, the soothing balm.

"You like Oyakodon…but you would probably rather it with salmon and ikura, ne?" Watanuki said with a little smirk that subtly summed up his need to use a different route whenever he asked for prepared meals. Watanuki was smoothing his hand over his futon and then looking him in the eyes, his smile having lost the curbed corner and now softer, prettier, more thoughtful.

It hit Doumeki, right at that moment, why the avenging ghosts, the spirits, the troubled people and all their sins came after Watanuki. Why powerful guardians like the pipe fox, the Zashiki Warashi, and even that kind kitsune vendor with his son. Why that dead woman, who had yearned for a son and had found one in Watanuki could not help but be pulled towards the boy.

"I could always make you something else if you don't want that. I have some left over zaru soba in my fridge. I made more than enough for Yuko-san yesterday, but she'd ended up changing her mind at the last minute."

Plainly put, Kimihiro Watanuki was a saint. Even when he was yelling his head off at you and being a complete ass—to him—he was still holding onto that aspect of his personality that was giving and sweet and made the Buddhist priests he had seen conversing with his grandfather look like horrible sinners.

Watanuki was so kind to people, to complete strangers. Always wanting to help, to rescue, to bring peace to others, even at the cost of his own comfort and health.

Watanuki was…

"Are you okay?" Watanuki, crawling over his futon stopped right in front of him, his head cocked to the side curiously as he continued to watch him with his one eye and the most sincere look he had ever seen on…anyone.

He was standing up by the time Doumeki could realize what was happening, his mind racing with questions, wondering if it was even possible to fall in love with someone all over again, even when you'd already fallen so hard the first time, that you couldn't even stand up straight afterwards.

And so, it was from this train of thought that he had ended up with Watanuki in their current position.

Watanuki, clinging to his back and whispering to him in that tender voice to not make too much noise, to consider where they were, to not stop.

His legs had practically buckled from under him at the sound of those words, until he was sliding them both to the floor, Watanuki's back still pressed against the wall, still straddling his waist and him sitting down on his shins.

"After…" he said distracted by Watanuki's mouth, "I'll find…something. I'll find a way to get your eye back." His fingers had found the two strings that kept the thin piece of gauze in place over Watanuki's eye, had eased in under and snapped it over his ear so he was now looking into the lucid eye. The warm, inviting blue of his other eye contrasting in such a way that made him want to dispel this curse even more.

Something within him, at that moment had compelled him to place a kiss on the eyelid of that sightless eye. He was promising himself, that no matter what the consequences, no matter his methods and his pride, he was going to get Watanuki's eye back, even if it killed him.

* * *

**A/n:** In holic fashion, here are the definitions: 

**1.**Oyakodon (Oyako Domburi)  
Mother and Child Domburi  
The name of this popular domburi dish comes from its two main ingredients, chicken and egg. Very rarely, a domburi with salmon and ikura (salmon eggs) may also be called Oyakodo

**2.**Soba noodles: Made of buckwheat and wheat flour, as thick as spaghetti and prepared in various hot and cold dishes. Most basic soba dish is zaru soba in which boiled, cold soba noodles are eaten with a soya based dipping sauce. (tsuyu)

Definitions taken from some website that I can't remember.


	7. Dream and Reality

**A/n:** This starts up strange and ends strange. It just came to me suddenly. It's the last angsty, semi-humorous, semi-fluff introspective pieces I'll be doing for this story, which means onward to an actual plot…and stuff. Ahh my pointlessness burns! Anyway for this chapter, I don't think it's too far off to assume that Doumeki can see certain things in his dreams, not with the connection him and Watanuki share and other weird things that Clamp can throw into a story for the heck of it. I'm looking at you, Legal drug, which I love too. I'm a raging Clamp whore!

Also, to all those who have stuck with this story, thank you so much! I read your lovely reviews and it gives me a burst of energy.

* * *

I've dreamt about Watanuki before. 

And I've seen things in those dreams that had me second-guessing whether they were really dreams and maybe some kind of disjointed memory.

I've seen things that I know I shouldn't be able to see, felt things that I know shouldn't be possible for me to feel, to know, to witness…

I've seen him sitting up at night, clutching his pillow to his chest and praying that whatever was outside, would stay outside tonight.

I've seen him when he was younger crying in a corner, clinging desperately to his spot, because the teacher had banished him from the safety of the classroom because he was making too much noise about things that didn't existed. And quite frankly, he was scaring the other children.

I've seen him before the haunting became too much and after, when he'd be bent over his toilet and his stomach wasn't strong enough yet to handle the scent and the presence of death and he was vomiting up his lunch.

I've seen the first day he walked into Yuuko's shop with a sigh of relief.

I've seen him walk out with a knot of dread at what always awaited him outside.

I've seen him break dishware because he was too tired to keep his eyes open and his mind alert, not when it had been too occupied with peeping out from under his covers the night before as he heard something scratch against his window.

I've seen him, once in a dream, whisper my name over and over again like a prayer, like the mantra summoning a protector god until his voice, hoarse with use gave up to the restless hands clawing at him. His dream ending and my nightmare beginning as I realized I could not come to him, not in a dream.

I've seen him smile during a hot, summer day, the breeze warm on his face, him sweating lightly, but still placid in his spot under the bloomless Sakura tree.

I've seen him--at that exact moment-- turn that smile on me, reluctantly but still warm and kind and mesmerizing. Seen him hold his hand out to me and call me over to sit next to him, patting the spot like it was meant only for me. Seen him brush hair away from his eyes coyly and bite his lower lip and nuzzle up to me when I joined him.

Although me calling that last scenario a memory wasn't completely true. Not when I knew I also had nightly fantasies about Watanuki too.

It wasn't my fault. I was a teenage boy. It was bound to happen…well not bound to happen, as I had liked girls before. Although liking hadn't really consisted of me seeking them out and conversing with them, no my kind of liking had consisted of me thinking she was pretty, or she was cute and doing absolutely nothing about that thought because that's all it was, a thought to me. No one really caught my interest enough to compel me towards action.

I had wondered if something was wrong with me, as I watched the entire male population of my grade sputter and clamber over themselves for a girlfriend. Watanuki didn't seem too different from the rest of the guys in our class when it came to that aspect of his personality. How he was always trying to woo over Kunogi and failing miserably, because she was a nice girl and didn't have a mindset to understand that Watanuki had a huge crush on her.

I had thoughts about sex before. Every guy did my age. What it would be like? What it would feel like? Why everyone always made such a big deal out of it? Then I'd lose interest with that train of thought after a couple of minutes, because I had more fun staring off blankly than actually pondering on things that didn't concern me.

Then I started to notice Watanuki. Little by little, I started to notice how he would wear his scarf some days during winter classes. It was weird. I was baffled by Watanuki's scarf, the black one with the frayed ends and a…strange tag that had what looked like cosplay wings on it.

I didn't have a scarf. I don't think I ever wore one in my life.

It was weird.

And then there were corresponding thoughts that came out of nowhere, on how much that one, black, thin, slender piece of cotton cloth had suited Watanuki. Especially on windy days when it was whipping around him and he couldn't control its motions as he ran past me or a whole body of students on his way to and from wherever it was he was going—because Watanuki at that time had always seemed to me like he was in a constant hurry.

That scarf belonged on him.

And then when winter was over and we exchanged our dark coats for our traditional uniform, I would just forget about the scarf, because I didn't stay too long on things, even if they did happen to catch my eye.

I always ended up forgetting about them.

It was inevitable.

It was just a piece of clothing.

Bought in an ordinary store.

I didn't bring it up again.

Then I found myself one day, wondering how Watanuki would look without his glasses. The thought had just struck me suddenly, like the scarf.

It was during class and he had sleepily rubbed his cheek with the back of his hand, the spot now tinged pink as he let his hand drop away from his face and he made a half content, half groggy sound.

He'd fixed his glasses back on his nose then and went back to listening to the teacher lecture on as I watched him from across the classroom.

I forgot about that strange fascination until I was suddenly reminded about it the day I carried him to the nurse's office when he had collapsed.

By that time I was more than noticing that maybe…I had a tiny crush on Watanuki.

He'd looked strange without it. Like those glasses was a fixed feature on his face, like a nose, or a mouth or his blue eyes. And in a weird way I had seen them as just that.

That Watanuki wasn't Watanuki without his glasses.

Although Watanuki without glasses wasn't bad to look at. It was strange how fragile looking he appeared with them off. Like he would break if I tried to touch him, although these thoughts were probably being influenced by the condition he had been at the time. I guess now I connoted a sick Watanuki to be without his glasses, because it was the second time that I had to carry him from the shop to my house, when he woke up in a cold sweat, again without his glasses, that it'd made an impression.

I can remember quite distinctly how a sick Watanuki looks.

It was the same day that I had _killed_ in his name and even though that woman wasn't alive, I knew what I had done was murder, because the look on Watanuki's face had told me so.

I would never forget that look. I'd never seen him cry. I don't think I ever saw anything so heartbreaking.

I could never forget him at that moment.

It was impossible, because Watanuki had somehow with his tear-streaked face and hurt, anguished eyes had imprinted that moment in my memory with the force a death in the family could instill or a debilitating injury.

It hurt that much.

I'd realized that I was very much now stuck on Wantanuki and that my crush had turned into something entirely else.

I liked Watanuki more than it was normal for a boy to like another boy.

I wondered after that if maybe I was gay.

Maybe I was. I didn't know.

I found girls attractive, but I'd never tried to get a girlfriend. I kind of felt different from all the guys in my class. Maybe…

I'd found out in the boy's locker room that afternoon after practice that I still didn't have a name for what I had been stricken with because sure I liked Watanuki a lot, but any other guy was…just like any other guy. I don't know. From a certain viewpoint a lot of them were probably…attractive, but they were still…how should I put this…not too bright and…just unpleasant on the eyes.

I guess I was prettying up the fact that I found them stupid and butt-ugly.

Every guy was stupid and butt-ugly to me.

Watanuki was confusing the _hell _out of me.

And it was frustrating because I'd began to have all kinds of wet dreams about him during this time and it was raking my concentration and my nerves.

He'd also started being extra bitchy to me. Even more bitchy and I was sometimes on my last nerve with him.

It was amazingly annoying to have to get up early every morning and wash my sheets because of my suddenly overactive imagination. Plus the extra bitchyness and how much I just wanted to fuck him through the wall some days.

I'd started masturbating to relieve the stress of it, and then I'd end up picturing Watanuki and forgetting that I was trying to relieve stress and not work myself up anymore than I already was.

Needless to say I was very frustrated and very angry.

And it really hadn't helped the situation when he threw my protection back in my face, when he invoked the curse of the spider on his own terms.

And then…

He deserved all of it. And even if he hated me for all the things I've done, I can't help but selfishly cling to the idea that originally this was _all_ his fault. Because the first time I'd met Watanuki, I don't know why, but I suddenly wanted to tease him.

To defend myself, Watanuki had been begging for it. Especially when he'd stared me straight in the eyes and asked what my name was, trying really hard to keep his polite smile on his face and being all kinds of fake nice and all out hiding the fact that something about me didn't sit too well with him.

I was usually pretty levelheaded to let things of that nature slide, and he was being really civil about it and trying to be nice, but something about it, about him, just rubbed me the wrong way. To the point where I wanted to…pick on him, for instance, maybe reaching out and stealing his glasses, or pushing him a little, or even out right tripping him. Okay, and I can understand how psychotic that made me sound, especially when this was our first time meeting and he was being really nice and patient.

I'd realized after a couple of minutes in his company that something about Watanuki had instantly triggered something within me. I wasn't the bullying type. I would rather leave people alone, because I always appreciated the same courtesies done unto me.

Watanuki though, I don't know why, I just couldn't stop myself from smirking at him in an overly smug way that I hadn't even known I could pull off and then quite out of the blue, calling him an…idiot.

It was barbaric.

I didn't even know him for more than five minutes and I had already picked a fight with him. And suddenly out of nowhere, he was picking a fight with me and I found that strange…and exciting because no one ever bothered me before. Or called me names for that matter. It was nice, because it felt like I was actually interacting with someone, instead of watching, or having passive, boring conversation.

Watanuki was like a breath of fresh air.

"I don't need this from someone with a face that's probably indistinguishable from a statue."

Watanuki was also one hell of a bitch.

"_Go nosedive into a cement block!"_

A bitch that had such sweet manners and ungodly shouting capabilities.

"_Annoying, apathetic jackass!"_

"_If I had a coin for every time I wanted to slap you, I'd be able to buy Japan and then kick you out of it!"_

"_You only know how to shove food in and not chew! CHEW GODDAMN YOU! CHEW!"_

"_Be thankful that Himawari-chan has taken pity on your sad existence enough to speak to you, face-to-face, and not ten feet away, like the rest of humanity."_

"_Why can't you just listen to me when I'm speaking to you, YOU WALKING TREE!"_

"_Stop smirking! It makes babies cry."_

"_One day I'm going to take that bow and shove it so far up-"_

It was sad that I could remember all these instances in time. It was even sadder that I remembered them with such fondness that it made me question my sanity.

Maybe I was a masochist.

Although, Watanuki wasn't all spice, even when he wanted to be.

He was surely coming around.

And there wasn't a soul alive that could say otherwise, even Watanuki himself, when he was baking for me on a regular basis and doling out all kinds of covert sweetness under the cover of tepid insults.

"_Are you hungry? I could probably make something for you, but don't be a jackass and hand it out to people like it's yours to give."_

"_You don't have to come with me…if you don't want to. I'm fine!"_

"_You have Archery practice today? Hmm…well hurry up and go away and here I packed croquettes for you."_

"_I didn't know you were that good at Archery. That's kind of…cool. You aren't though!"_

"_That's no excuse for laziness. I guess I'll help you."_

"_Doumeki…"_

_"Thank you."_

_"Harder...!"_ Opps, how'd that one get in there? Well it was pretty impossible of him to try and separate Watanuki's being nice to him without incorporating some type of sexual activity. And it was the only time that Watanuki was ever _super_ nice to him.

_"Nggghh…Doumeki!"_ Really, he could try and stop this current train of thought but he was way too tired and horny to care anymore.

**

* * *

**A/n: Let's remember that Doumeki is a boy in his teens. Right now in his life--even though he doesn't seem it--hormones play a huge role in his life. Every teenager is a hormonal mess…you know what, scrap that, every human being is a hormonal mess. Yeah us! Anyway, I'm trying to give him some human qualities dammit, even though he doesn't seem that way in the manga. These are issues I think he would ask himself and it was fun for me to track his crush on Watanuki throughout the timeline, and point out some of the factors that played into causing those feelings in the first place. 


	8. Introductions

**A/n:** Okay this is all still in the setting up of the eventual plot, and even though it doesn't seem like anything important is happening, key character introduced. The next chapter will be somewhat like this, but oh you'll see…hehehe (perverted grin).

* * *

I don't think I've ever brought anyone over to have dinner before. Its always just been my grandfather and me. This temple is large enough where we barely run into each other during the makings of a day, and with me preoccupied with school and him busy around the community—a retired priest still has a lot of advice to offer—we only see each other during dinner. 

"Stop fidgeting." I tell Watanuki because the boy's self-conscious twitching is distracting me from my thoughts as we walk up the path to my house.

"Don't tell me to stop fidgeting." He shouts at me and disturbs some birds hopping about in a puddle. He then says in a tiny voice, "I'm nervous. What if he turns out to be an asshole like you? It must be in the genes. How else can you explain your manners?" He says snootily.

"My grandfather's nice." I say just to make him feel better, and then I realize how that makes me sound. "I'm nice to you."

I get an amused snort in response and annoyingly enough more fidgeting.

"He's going to hate me."

"Why?" I question noticing how sensitive he's been acting ever since yesterday, when I had cornered him and asked him if he could come over today.

"Why! I…I'm _contaminating_ an only son." He says it like the world's going to end as soon as he's finished with this ridiculous statement.

I feel like teasing him all of a sudden, "How do you know I'm an only son?"

I watch with great pleasure as he takes the bait, his body halting on the path and his head turning slowly to give me a horrified stare. "You mean there's more of you! Why would god do that to this Earth! To the human race!" He looks like he's about to run for the gates, but before he can make for an exit I grab him by the forearm and drag him towards the house.

"I don't have any siblings." I tell him and he's still watching me with that same terrified, aghast look that says he's not convinced. I explain to him, "I was joking."

He narrows his eyes and says quite plainly, "That's not funny asshole."

"I thought it was."

"What was that?"

We continue towards my house, until we're on the steps and suddenly he's grabbing my hand to stop me from sliding open the **1.**fusuma.

"No, no, not yet. I have to mentally prepare myself." Watanuki checks around him like there's someone listening in on our conversation and then he takes a deep breath.

I assume his preparations are complete and I again try to slide the fusuma open, except Watanuki has a pale-fingered death grip on my forearm.

"I'm not done!" He pats himself down like he's on fire; I assume he is in that little, nonsensical brain of his. "I think you should just go on ahead. I'll come in"-

I slide the fusuma open interrupting his sad excuse to sneak away when I'm not looking.

**2.**"Tadaima." I call out and Watanuki goes into fits.

"Shhhh!" He has his finger up to his mouth and his shushing is even louder than my greeting and I think about how illogical Watanuki as a person is.

"Grandfather." I call out as I slip off my shoes and wait for Watanuki to do the same. He complies only when he sees that I'm getting ready to go find my grandfather.

"Wait!" He yips behind me, as he hops out of his shoes and places them very neatly in the **3.**genkan.

At least, this way he can't run away without his shoes.

Although this is Watanuki we're talking about. I wouldn't hold it against the skinny bastard to try something so…idiotic.

"Maybe you're Grandfather's not home." He says a little too elated for my liking.

"You wish." I slide open another partition and he scurries meekly behind me.

"Can't we talk about this? He says panicked. "Maybe I should have brought something."

"Like a cake." I add and he reacts exactly the way I want him to.

"No, you dirty, dirty pervert!"

"Excuse me?" I hear my grandfather step forward, and Watanuki in that moment seems to be stricken by some form of rigor mortis--despite him still breathing-- that has its own creaking and cracking sound effects and can render the person afflicted with it completely still, like a block of concrete.

It's pretty funny that Watanuki's first words to my grandfather are _those_.

He doesn't see the humor though. "Uh…I…" he blinks, does this funny motion with his hands and then sputters out, "I was…"

"Shizuka?" My grandfather looks confused which is only normal, since Watanuki does confuse normal people.

"This is Kimihiro Watanuki." I introduce him and my grandfather's eyes go wide.

My grandfather quickly smiles to cover his shock, "It's nice to meet you."

Watanuki suddenly remembers his manners and bows low. "Oh! Nice to meet you too!" He exclaims and I want to tell him that my Grandfather doesn't have a hearing problem.

"I heard a lot about you from Shizuka." My grandfather adds and I wonder if there's some kind of contract between family that makes it okay to say embarrassing stuff about you.

Watanuki who still hasn't recuperated from his scarring first impression, is now staring at my grandfather, his mouth a little agape and I can't say I'd expected for Watanuki to freeze up like this.

My grandfather smiles again to lighten the mood and Watanuki, looking the older man in the eyes blushes and looks away. He looks at the floor and smiles a little too himself, the blush still smeared over the bridge of his nose.

I look at my grandfather and then I look back at Watanuki who's still sporting a blush.

"Watanuki came over to make dinner for us." Watanuki who usually puts up a fight whenever I speak for him, smiles at my grandfather, bows politely and says, "Would it be alright with you sir if I used your kitchen?"

My grandfather smiles back warmly at him and I can completely understand his reaction to Watanuki, because there's no way he could get any cuter.

He scratches behind his neck and blushes even more.

Okay I take that back. Now there's absolutely no way he could get any cuter.

"I don't think I feel too decent with welcoming an honored guest into my home to cook." My grandfather says with that smile that has Watanuki ten shades redder than I've ever seen him, even when we're having sex.

How does my grandfather do it?

I suppose I should ask him later.

"Oh no, I don't mind. It's no problem. I like cooking." Watanuki explains hurriedly.

"Well, I can't say that I mind. I've sampled one of the lunches you've prepared for Shizuka. He certainly is lucky to have such a skilled friend."

"Oh well…" Watanuki is so red that he could probably compete with a tomato. He laughs a little and then he's bowing again to my grandfather. "It won't take long. I promise not to break anything and I'll clean up afterwards." He bows again.

I kind of feel left out with my grandfather getting all the attention.

"I'm hungry." And for all my efforts I get the nastiest glare in his arsenal. He shifts his body so my grandfather is spared any accidental _"glarage"_ that could have bounced off of me and landed on him.

He then beams at my grandfather, kind of sparkly and angelic and I want to point out the heinous double standard happening here. Watanuki doesn't give me the chance though because he suddenly has his hands on my back and is pushing me forward. "Can you take me to the kitchen, Doumeki?" He says sweetly in the presence of my grandfather.

**……………………………………………………………………………………………… **

"He's so…different than what I expected." Watanuki coos from his place in front of the sink as he washes his hands thoroughly.

"Huh?" I ask and he continues on in a wistful manner that has nothing to do with me, or even my response.

"He's so handsome." Watanuki suddenly points out and then blushes because he hadn't meant to say it. "I mean," he covers, "…how old is he?"

"He's in his seventies."

"Really?" Watanuki says, looking like he wants to faint like a girl.

"Yeah." I add a little annoyed.

"He's so distinguished looking like a…a movie star. He's so tall."

"Yeah." I say again and watch Watanuki as he swoons over to the counter to get his utensils ready.

"If he dyed his hair black…I bet you couldn't even tell that he was in his seventies." Watanuki carries on, "Although the gray hair does make him look so mature…and dashing."

I turn to Watanuki with a tick in my eye, "Do you want me to arrange the wedding now or would you rather be a spring bride?"

"Huh?" He comes out of his daydreaming long enough to tilt his head at me and blink curiously.

"Forget it." I say as I mope toward a stool. He really knows how to make a guy feel special.

"What are you going on about?" Watanuki snaps, as he rolls up his sleeves and puts on his apron.

"He looked a lot like me when he was younger." I don't know what was going through my head when I said this, but it was obviously very petty and small.

"Hmm." Watanuki looks like he's thinking that statement over and I wish I could take that sentence back. "I guess I see the family resemblance." He smiles a little like I'm not even in the room. "Oh, but he's so good-looking and has the nicest manners."

I'm better-look--

I immediately stop myself from thinking out that whole thought.

And then I proceed to make a complete ass out of myself. "I'll most likely look like him when I get older." I throw out there and watch him curiously as he processes this information in the tower of nonsensical blabber that is Watanuki's brain.

"Hmm." His eyes aren't looking at me, as they are now looking up at the ceiling in deep thought. He furrows his brow, his eyes narrow and then widen like he's having an internal dispute with him, for all I know he probably is. "You think?" He asks me hopefully and even though he's cooking us dinner and being cute, I feel an insistent urge to kick or trip him.

"I'll probably be better looking." There is something definitely wrong with me today.

"How do you figure?" He asks with a raised eyebrow.

If there is a god in heaven right now, let him strike me down so I cannot continue to make an ass out of myself. "Every generation gets better looking. It's just…how things work."

No they don't. Why am I lying?

"Well you are _very_ good-looking."

Oh, this is why.

"Although," Watanuki props his head up in his hands and I don't like how he's sighing like a lovelorn princess, "He's so nice and his smile is _so_ familiar."

Familiar? Did Watanuki remember my grandfather? It didn't seem like it, but maybe he was having a bit of déjà vu. He'd met grandfather when he was younger and I was told only once, as all the rest of the times he had been sick or grieving his lost parents. Under those conditions I don't see how my grandfather could even be recognizable to Watanuki, much less existent, but my grandfather did have a certain way of leaving an impression on people…maybe…

"I guess that's weird." Watanuki said as he smiled softly and went back to his tasks.

I stay quiet because I don't know the reason why my grandfather hadn't told Watanuki upon meeting his connection to his parents. It could be that my grandfather didn't want to stir up bad memories for Watanuki. It made sense. My grandfather was a very wise and considerate man.

**

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****A/n: **Feedback very much appreciated. 

**1.Fusuma-** opaque sliding vertical partitions, sliding doors.

**2.Taidama-**"I'm home!"

**3. genkan-** low place at the entrance of the house to keep shoes.


	9. Fleeting

**A/n:** _Obscene_ amounts of sex in this chapter. What happened to the plot? I have no idea. Harharhar…me the pervert. Har.

Thank you all for such great reviews. You guys are really nice and the reviews always make me smile and laugh. I can't thank you all enough for sticking with me. I want to give you all money, or cookies, or some form of material compensation…uh can I gift wrap feelings? I'm poor.

* * *

"Best meal I've ever had, Watanuki-kun. You outdo yourself for us." My grandfather compliments as he puts his chopsticks down and sips his tea.

"I didn't." Watanuki smiles at him and pours my grandfather more green tea when his cup's approaching empty.

When _my_ cup was approaching empty, all I get was a weird stare thrown my way as I picked it up and put it back down to demonstrate how light it was on account of me drinking…_all_ the tea in it.

I want my refill.

Watanuki, however just continues to ignore me and concentrates on being as nice and sweet as humanely possible to my grandfather without falling into his lap and declaring his love.

When dinner was over and I'm helping—staring—at Watanuki as he washes dishes, fawning over my grandfather's dinner conversation and his impeccable taste when it came to…something that had to do with food and…where was this conversation going?

"However I squint at it, there's just no getting over how vastly--vastly!--different you two are. Like the moon and a frog."

I ended up tripping him after all.

* * *

"I'm still mad at you. What would make you think it would be a _good _idea to stretch your foot out when I was passing by?" 

"I caught you so what's the difference?"

"You nearly dropped me!"

"I didn't though."

"You almost did!"

"This is my room." I say to get away from the topic of certain persons tripping other persons.

"Spartan." He answers back like a reflex that had jumped under a hammer.

"You don't like it?" Of course he didn't.

"It's nice. You're surprisingly neat."

I'll surprisingly trip you again.

Watanuki, looking around passes his hand over my desk and chair, his fingers coming away like he was inspecting for dust. "Well we can't expect too much." He says proudly, as he flicks his fingers of the light speckles that had accumulated there.

"You should inspect my bed too." I add flippantly and he squints his eye at me.

"Why?"

"Maybe there's more dust under the covers."

Shameless sex ploy #244B.

"Okay." He says slowly and instead of moving towards my bed, he moves away.

Far away.

"Stop creeping me out and point me in the direction of your extra futon."

Extra futon?

"Why?" I ask, because I really want to know the answer to this one.

"Isn't it obvious. I want to sleep."

Sleep?

"Why?" I ask again because there has to be a logical reason behind this extra futon, sleep business.

"Because…I don't want to sleep on the bare floor without a futon…and it's kind of cold. I don't know how much more I can explain this to you without drawing some type of diagram." He stares at me with a duh' expression.

I point to my futon. "You can sleep there."

Watanuki shakes his head, "I can't take your bed. That's rude."

Rude? Did Watanuki have some form of selective amnesia? Could someone even consciously inflict that upon themselves?

That was pretty funny. Watanuki was attempting to be _un-rude_ to me.

I wasn't though.

"I'm still sleeping in it." I say, which makes Watanuki go "huh?"

"But you just said I could have it."

There was no other response to this other than, "You're slow."

"I…?" Then the gears in Watanuki's clock tower were grinding away and something seems to click. "I DON'T WANT TO FUCKING SHARE A BED WITH YOU, KISAMA!

"Why?"

"AHHHHHHHHHH." Watanuki in response to my question is now screaming and looking like he's very close to ripping his hair out.

"Keep it down, my grand-"

And like the switch had been flipped, Watanuki gets immediately quiet at the mere mention of my grandfather. He starts hissing at me, "How can you even suggest we share the same…uhgg…when your grandfather is close by-"

"He's on the other side of the house." I correct.

Watanuki, mouth still open from when I had cut him off closes it and then starts back over again, "Then why the hell did you tell me to keep it down?"

"You're loud. People on the other side of the neighborhood would be able to hear you."

"I'm _definitely_ not sharing that bed with you. I'd rather sleep standing up."

"Okay, suit yourself." I say and without further ado, I lie down on the futon.

"Ah, you're going to sleep! Wake up!" He's leaning over me and shaking me awake and I go slacker just to bother him. "Doumeki."

For some reason, him saying my name like that has me suddenly opening my eyes. There's something…wrong-sounding about it.

He blinks down at me when he sees me looking up at him.

"What?" He stops shaking me and puts his hands up in the air in front of his face like they were about to do some unspeakable crime.

I sit up, watch him scoot to the side to give me some room and then I stare at him intensely.

He looks behind him, and then when he realizes that I'm looking at _him_, he puts his hand on my hair and then manually turns my head so I'm facing away from him.

"Don't stare at me like that. What's your problem?"

I don't know exactly why I'm doing this. I guess I'm looking to see if something about Watanuki has physically changed.

Nothing has though, but his voice, when he calls my name like that…

I think I know why it sounds weird.

"Hey."

He glares at me and rolls his eyes.

I smother my own glare and eye-rolling to move on to my request, "Call me…Shizuka."

Suddenly the eye-rolling is replaced by eye-bugging and Watanuki breaths in loudly. "What? Why…No!" He puts his hand in front of his face like he's offering up a prayer and waves it at me. "No, bad idea."

"Why?" I counter because I really want to know.

"If I start calling you by your first name, then you'll have to start calling me by my first name and…that's just weird." He shakes his head at me and scoots off the mattress.

I'm baffled, "What's so wrong with me wanting to call you by your first name?"

He stares at me, his eyes bugging out some more, "I have personal reasons for that. Okay, so just drop it and go to sleep."

He's standing up and I grab onto his hand to stop him from getting too far out of my reach.

"You can't tell me?" I question and he looks away.

"It's not that interesting. So just drop it." He says with more force than necessary.

"I'm curious." He pulls his hand away from me.

"Your stupid."

"I'm curious." I say again, and watch him huff and glare at the floor. He looks like he's deliberating with himself and then I look down at the space beside me and he catches me eyeing it.

He sits next to me, breaths in and then says, "It's weird…because no one has called me by my first name in years without the formalities and…yuh know. My parents were the last ones…okay!" He says and I watch him wring his hands self-consciously.

"Kimihiro." I say testing it out.

He blushes. "Shut up."

"Ki-mi-hi-ro," it suits him, like his glasses and that weird scarf.

"Ki-sa-ma." He says back and I watch him blush some more.

"Say it." I tell him because I want him to return the favor.

"Uh…yeesh. Alright." He concedes, "Shizuka," and then he tacks on a "dumbass" just for fun.

"Okay." I say and then I fall back to my futon and pretend like I'm going back to sleep.

"Okay! That's all you can say, bastard! Don't go to sleep!" He screeches and he's crawling closer and I can't help keep the smile off my face at how easy it is to rile him up. It's especially easy to get him within jumping range and as I wait for him to come closer, I ready myself for the task at hand, which in about three seconds will play out with me pouncing on him, and him cursing at me, and me shutting him up with a kiss…or a gag.

I ended up using a gag.

Because he'd bitten me when I'd tried to kiss him.

"Don't shove your dirty sheet in my mouth. Get off me idiot." He slaps his palm flat on my face and then proceeds to shove me away.

I bite him on the hand.

He curses and bites me back.

So there was a lot of biting going on before I bit him hard on the throat and instead of trying to bite me back, he'd gone limp and moaned.

He falls back to the futon and I put one of my hands on his shoulders to keep him there.

He didn't look like he was going to fight me, but one could never be too sure when an unpredictable creature like Watanuki came into play.

He could be bidding his time until I was within biting range.

Or kicking range.

Or slapping range.

Or any other range that I did not take into account.

My study desk isn't too far from my futon and it was exactly where I had placed the items I would need for tonight. I slide my drawer open and Watanuki who was still quietly laying on the bed flecks his gaze over to inspect what I have in my hand.

"I'm not into rough stuff." Watanuki supplies.

He could have fooled me, especially when he's biting my head off all the time for no good reason.

"Touch me funny and you lose that hand." He warns, and he was propping himself up on his elbows and gazing at me with a stare that plainly said try anything and someone was going to lose a head…or an arm, or hell, an eye.

He did want his back.

I put the item in question down next to his head and he gives it a sidelong glance before he realizes what it was. "What the hell are you doing with that stuff?"

I supply lamely that since I was in Archery, Archers like myself, who were really, really talented—he rolls his eyes for some reason—were commonly coming across the problem of dry, cracked hands.

He looks at me like he didn't know whether I was lying or telling the truth.

That seemed like a good sign.

"Tch…I guess." He says nonchalantly and then he's moving his face closer to the nozzle and sniffing. "It smells kind of like…sugar."

"Hmm." Yeah, it did. It was the exact reason why I had bought it in the first place.

"That's really girly, Shi-zu-kaa." Watanuki teases, his straight nose daintily sniffing at the fragrance like it had offended him with its mere presence. "I should tell all those guys on the Archery team."

"It smells like you." I offer and he sniffs it again and looks at me funny, "What drugs have you been smoking? This doesn't smell like me. I don't smell like a girl."

"You smell like sugar though." I add, because he really did.

"I…" he looks at me funny again and then sniffs his forearm. "I smell like laundry detergent."

"You're just not sniffing hard enough." Hmm, that sentence just now…made me sound like a real…

"Pervert!" He puts his arms in front of his face like I was about to unveil my perversion in some form of spectacle show.

I blink at him.

He blinks back with his arms still shielding his face.

Then he lowers his arms and coughs into his palm. "Why did you bring that out here?"

I thought it was obvious, unless he wants me to spell it out for him.

"S-e-x."

"Oh." He falls back to the mattress and says quite loudly, "I give up."

Was that a yes, then?

"I'm too tired to fight you today." He rubs right above the bandaged eye.

"Does it hurt?" I ask, sobering up from the reminder of the curse.

"Oh, no…it's just weird." He says vaguely and then he's sitting up and reaching out for me.

I slide right into his arms and press him back into the bed. "What's so weird about it?"

He shifts, trying to get comfortable. "Nothing." He closes his eyes, like he's waiting for me to kiss him.

I don't.

He opens his eyes and he looks irritated, "Do you need me to write out an invitation or something?" He says disbelievingly.

"Does it hurt?" I ask again, because I really want to know what was wrong. Watanuki's "nothing" was unlike other normal people's "nothing" in that his "nothings" usually ended up as a potentially dangerous situation for him.

"No." He says quickly, his fingers already in my hair and tugging me down to his mouth.

"You're lying." I say flatly and he stops before our mouths connect.

"You make it really, really hard to get in the mood, yuh know that." He's shoving me away and I kiss him because we'll be running in circles forever if this was left up to him. He kisses back, but not as enthusiastically as I wish he would. I don't mind putting out more effort. It was usually how things work between us.

I slide my tongue past his lips, feel it glide over his front teeth, his mouth opening to accept it almost lazily until I felt my body gradually sinking into his, his own tenseness melting away and the kiss deepening in one swift shift of my mouth.

He grips the tendons in my neck and pulls, and my hands that had been clutching the sheets to his sides come up to cup his neck. On passing though, one of my hands knock over the lotion and the thud seems to remind me why I'd brought it out here in the first place.

I pull back, hovering over him.

I reach over for the bottle and his fingers surprisingly enough were already working me out of my shirt.

He's wearing one of my yukatas and it didn't take much to slip it off his shoulders, the material parting around his thin body, giving me the chance to roll him out of it. I'm having some problems with the button on my pants and Watanuki with his long fingers deftly snaps it open as he pulls the zipper down and helps me out of it.

I reach for the bottle again and slather lotion on my hand.

Everything suddenly smells…like sugar.

"It's really sweet." Watanuki say, scrunching his nose up.

I rub the lotion into my index finger with my thumb, my other hand grabbing onto one of his thighs and pulling it to the side so he's opening up his legs for me.

"Hey!" He bats my hand away and pushes at my shoulders and I let him move me with the momentum so that I'm suddenly on my back and he's straddling me.

He blushes. "Eh, this is not what you think." He looks down at me, his hair in his eyes and his hands on my chest.

"You want top now." I smirk at him and he gets ten shades redder than I expect him to. "No…I…"

"Why not?" I cut him off, because we've been together more than once now, and I wonder why he doesn't want to try.

"It's…embarrassing," and he closes his one eye like it's all too much for him to take. "I don't really know…what to do." His eyes are still closed and he looks way too tense for my liking.

I understand not to pressure him into anything and I guess he would rather have me take lead, but for what reason I don't know why. I guess he is really shy when it comes to things like this, but…

My hand comes around behind him and I let it slide down his lower back and cup his seat. He jumps, blushes, squirms right on top of me, and digs his blunt fingernails into my chest.

My erection throbs; I know he can feel it pressing against his thigh and I let my finger push and sink into him.

"Mmphh." His knees dig into my sides, right under my arms and it gives him some balance. I put my other hand on his waist, my fingers curling around his hipbone so I can guide him exactly how I want him to move. He swallows a breath and kneads his hands into my ribs as I push into his hipbone with the pad of my thumb and raise him up.

My finger slides out of him and he seems to finally understand what I want him to do. He slides right back down, his arms now on both sides of my head as he uses them to help lift him off my finger and slide back down again.

I push a second finger inside of him and he continues to ride it.

My stomach flips with arousal and I press my hand closer to his waist. I notice his hipbone juts out a lot, just like his clavicle and his spine when he's bending down or sitting and he's shirtless. He has a very small, almost almond-shaped birthmark on the inside of his thigh. It's sandy colored and even though he's pale, it blends in and is easily missed.

Watanuki gives a breathless moan, his hand shifting somewhere near my head and I can suddenly smell more of that scent as he places his hand on my chest, his palm now smooth and slippery with lotion as it passes down my bare stomach. He rubs me right under my navel and it's almost like his fingers are inside my skin, like his touch is that deep.

His fingertips glide over the sensitive skin there and I close my eyes against his ministrations, his index finger now trailing down until suddenly he has me pulsing and stiff in his grasp.

I open my mouth, I don't know why, but it can't stay close with Watanuki's soft palm sliding down my erection. "Uh…" my lower body seems to have a mind of its own and it lifts off the mattress, which makes Watanuki curl his hand tighter around me and I can feel the lotion between his fingers. He rubs me once firmly and before I can shout he slaps a hand over my mouth.

I open my eyes dazedly.

"Now who's being loud?" He smirks down on me and I don't have the energy to answer back because he's suddenly sliding his hand up on me again.

Watanuki's keeps his hand over my mouth.

It smells a little like flour.

I squeeze my eyes shut and try to breath through my nose without making too much noise. It doesn't work. Watanuki's hand is soft, incredibly soft, like he's never touched anything in his life with that hand. The skin between his forefinger and thumb is especially tender and it was rubbing into the bared head of my erection and…

My other hand slips back to his hip and I clench them tighter around him in a warning to stop, because I want to come inside of him, not on him.

He hisses and his fingers come up to pull at the hand digging into his hipbone.

"That hurts you idiot. Why don't you just relax?"

His fingers pry into my grip and he suddenly has my hand in his and he's holding onto it and linking them together, before placing it over my head and leaning his weight into it.

"Mmph." I involuntarily jerk up into his hold, my erection unconsciously seeking out the warmth of his inner thigh. His hands suddenly break away from what they're doing so he can retain his balance.

"It's like you thrive on my annoyance." One of his knees dig into my side, right above my ribs, and my hands clamp back down around his hips again, pulling and shifting until he's right on top of my shaft. "Impatient..." He crows and I don't care how this makes me look, because it aches and I just want to bury myself inside of him and make it stop hurting.

He huffs at me and shifts on top of me, getting into position, his back arches and he's leaning backwards, his long legs open and I can see his ribs when he stretches backwards.

He grabs me again and then he's easing down on top of me, layer upon layer of tight muscle that has me shaking and breathing like I have one punctured lung. Both of his long, skinny arms brace behind him, his fingers curving around my thighs as he uses them to push him up and off my dripping cock.

I grunt and my toes are curling and digging into the futon under me, my legs bending at the knees and his back now resting against them as his hands clumsily search out for another, steadier perch.

He slides back down on top of me hesitantly, his breath hitches and I choke on the saliva in my mouth. My hands tighten around him almost viciously and he flinches and drags his body back up my erection, his knees together, his head thrown back and he's worrying his bottom lip to keep the sound in with the occasional murmured words and moans slipping free.

Something seems to connect with the crown of my shaft as it slams uncontrollably up into him. His neck snaps back even further and he's looking up at the ceiling and whimpering loudly.

I connect with it again and his whole body trembles.

I pull him down on me again and he shrieks, loud enough where I _know_ my grandfather can hear us even if it is from across the house.

I don't think I even care.

I was so close and the pressure in my cock was killing me.

There was a tiny trickle of sweat running down his throat and one of my hands leap off his hip and sweeps at his neck. His skin's feverish and he has a blush that runs all the way over his chest and up to his cheeks.

He's rocking back and forth on me now, his hands scrabbling for purchase, it slips off my chest, clutches at my collarbone and shoulders and my hands skim up his sides so they can slide behind his neck and pull him down to my mouth.

He resists my kiss, straightening his spine and leans back against my raised knees, because we can't kiss and keep this position and he's keeping that in mind. He wants to finish and I just want to kiss him.

I want to kiss him.

I want to kiss him very badly and he's not letting me.

I see his tongue brush over his lips, see them press together and they're wet and they look even softer than I remember.

His legs are now open and it doesn't take much for my hand to reach up and take him in my sweaty palm, stroking him until he seizes up like a motionless sea before the storm and he's coming.

"Shizuka!"

He cries out much louder than I expect him to and I groan and come inside of him, because it isn't possible for me to hold back when I like Watanuki's voice so much, and the way he can say my name is more than enough driving stimulus for my brain to handle.

He collapses on my chest, his breath ragged and heavy and he's still moaning, because I'm still coming inside of him.

"Don't stop." He pleads, like he's still stuck in the moments past when we had been moving against each other. I finish with a last thrust and his hands clutch at my arms and then go slack when he knows it's okay to breath.

He's insensate, his legs still straddling my stomach and his body leaning heavily into mine. I roll us over and Watanuki tumbles back to the futon, his head hitting the pillow and his hands covering his eyes as he's still trying to get his breathing back down.

He shifts into fetal position and I wonder why he always does that after we finish having sex. It's like a ritual with him and I curl up behind him and try to get comfortable.

He's out like a light before I can even throw a hand over him.

**

* * *

A/n:** So…feedback appreciated and…hmm…I guess the smut melted my brain, so I have nothing left to say. 


	10. The Invisible Web

**A/n:** So I've never read past volume seven, since I don't think Volume 8 came out here yet, or hasn't come out in any of the bookstores near me. I don't know what happens after, so everything I write here is totally made up. No Spoilers people, for all those who are at my level. For the rest of you, who have read further ahead, just think of this as an AU type thing.

* * *

"Shizuka?" 

"Yes, grandfather."

"Why is your friend wearing a bandage over his right eye?"

I couldn't hide anything from him.

"You noticed the…"

"How could I not? Such an emphatic curse."

"He got it from the spider by the huge **Kuro-matsu**."

"Oh Shizuka, why did you not come to me before?"

"This is _my_ problem."

"Yes, but there are such things as aid, Shizuka."

"I don't think it's that easy."

"You're too stubborn. Is that the reason why you've been going through all my books?"

"There's nothing on a spider's grudge."

"Well of course there isn't. Not in any of those books. You won't find a published manuscript for such things. I have compiled my own cure and procedures in a book. It's hidden under the staircase and my hopeful wishes are that it may never see the light of day."

"Under the staircase?" I was getting up and my grandfather immediately put his hand out to stop me.

"Ah, you are too brash sometimes Shizuka, but I cannot fault you, since you are the splitting image of your father in that aspect."

"And my father was the splitting image of you."

"No. We were very different. Now tell me child, what do you plan do to with this book when you get it."

"Isn't it obvious?"

"Shizuka, I will tell you this, but do not take offense or think that I'm going senile. That spider will not simply allow you to override its curse. It _will_ take a sacrifice. A sacrifice that your friend may have to pay."

"Can't I pay it for him?"

"Shizuka, do you understand the consequences of any of this? I'm asking you right now because it seems like you don't."

"Will it take my eye permanently?"

"Are you afraid?"

"No. If it will take my eye in exchange for Watanuki's then-"

"Then what? Will it make him happy?"

"It will make _me_ happy."

"That's selfish, Shizuka. I never raised you to be like that."

"He's suffering. He's not speaking to me about it, but I know he is. Something's worrying him, but he just keeps…lying to me."

"He is a very resilient young man."

"Too resilient, grandfather."

"You are suffering from the same wounds."

"Then what should I do?"

"He wants his eye back?"

"Yes, but even that had taken a lot of persuading."

"You love him?"

"**…**"

"Come now Shizuka. I am not blind. Neither am I _deaf_."

I guess there wasn't going to be any surprise from this end when I asked Watanuki to marry me.

Heh. Watanuki though would probably die of shock, but that wouldn't stop me from putting--jamming if I had to--that damn ring on his finger.

"He's…special to me."

"You children. Your father was the same way when he was in love with your mother. I don't think I've ever seen a boy act more stupid in my entire life."

"Grandfather?"

"Yes child?"

"I want to try. Everyone around me from day one has been telling me how impossible this is and for some reason I don't understand why?"

"It's because you've never had to come up against something like this. You've been blessed with many things Shizuka. For something to not go your way now, it is understandable."

"I still want to try. I want to get his eye back."

"Then I will help you, but keep in mind, that this spider is not to be trifled with. It will eventually find out what you are trying to do and it will come for penance. And when that time comes Shizuka, I will not be able to help you. Even if you are my dear grandson."

"I understand, grandfather."

**…………………………………………………………………………………………… **

_"Draw water from a well on the night of a new moon…_

_Wash the missing eye socket with water. Then take the water… _

_And lure the **horuda uramigoto** into the very well… _

_Using the very same water. _

_It will turn white inside the well when all is forgiven."_

**……………………………………………………………………………………………… **

"Why do you have butterfly nets?" Watanuki asks Maru and Moro as they take turns running after one another in front of Yuko's shop while swiping their nets ineffectively at whoever was "it" at the time

I'm leaning up against the wall that runs along the shop.

Technically, I wasn't breaking any rules, since I was _not_ in Yuko-san's shop. I don't think the sidewalk counted as her territory.

"To catch." Maru singsongs in response to Watanuki's question.

"To catch." Moro repeats.

Watanuki looks confused and I can't blame him because I'm confused too.

Maru suddenly drops her net over Watanuki's head.

"Butterfly." Maru singsongs again.

"Pretty butterfly." Moro repeats.

"Arggh." Watanuki kicks, and screams, and finally comes free of the net, "Yuko-san better not be late. I'm counting on her to be the master of ceremonies." Watanuki looks up; the moon was almost translucent in the blue evening sky, "She better hurry up. We still have to go to your temple."

"My grandfather's getting the well ready."

"Really? Wow." Watanuki snickers, "Then I don't even have a use for Yuko-san," he says hauntingly and the older woman is suddenly ramming her high-heeled boots into Watanuki's spinal column via launching herself at him, feet first and squealing "Weeee" at the top of her voice.

Somehow she just pulls it off.

Anyone else though…

"Watanuki, I'm hurt. You shouldn't talk about your trusted and beloved employer like that, especially when she's here to save the day."

"Save the day." Maru chirps.

"Save the day." Moro repeats.

They wave their nets in the air enthusiastically and it catches Yuko-san's attention for some odd reason. "Time to go." She says, breaking her eyes away from the two girls and the colorful handles of the butterfly nets.

**……………………………………………………………………………………………… **

We arrive shortly thereafter and Yuko-san trounces off ahead to go meet my grandfather. By the time we reach the well, they're already having a conversation about…?

"Yuko-san!" Watanuki shrieks, trying to get the woman to stop asking my grandfather about his family lineage and where did he get those cool robes…

"Well then shall we get down to business," Yuko says, as she clips around my grandfather and pokes her head down the well.

"Will this do?" My grandfather asks and Yuko-san smiles and throws out a hand dramatically into the air. "It's like I did it myself. You have no idea how hard it is to get good help these days."

Watanuki growls under his breath.

All I knew was I didn't do it.

"Can we get on with it?" Watanuki asks impatiently.

The sky is already fast turning a dark color, the moon gradually becoming whiter and whiter as the starless darkness contrasts and further brings out its luminance. Yuko has a wooden ladle in her hand. She dips it into the well and swirls it around before taking it back out filled to the brim.

Watanuki is taking off his bandage so Yuko hands the dipper to me.

He sits down on the ground and I lean over him, my hand covering his good eye so he's staring up at me from the white mist of the non-seeing eye.

He suddenly gasps.

"What?"

He quickly answers a, "…N-nothing."

Nothing, huh?

I carefully tip the ladle over and it pours right over the eye in a slow trickle. He blinks and I move my hand to the cheek under his blind eye. My thumb goes under his eyelashes and I press the pad of my thumb down on his skin so it's pulling his eye open more.

The white of his eye reminds me of freshly fallen snow, or icicles that have just formed when the moon's light catches the moist glare of his eye as I continue to cleanse it.

The water has trailed in erratic paths down his face, down over his lips and his jaw, down his throat and his neck. The collar of his shirt was wet.

His mouth was a little open and he was looking up at me with his glass-like eye, and if Yuko-san or my grandfather hadn't been standing right there, I knew I would have kissed him.

I pull away and let the last of the water trail down his cheek. I gather up more water from the well in the ladle and then I'm waiting for him to follow after me as I prepare to walk to the Kuromatsu tree.

My eyes flicker over briefly to where Yuko-san is standing and I notice she has one of those small, knowing smiles on her face. I can't shake the feeling that I should go back and ask her why she's smiling like that, but I know she's not going to tell me.

We reach the pine tree and for some reason, it looks bigger than usual.

"Here, give me the water." Watanuki puts his hand out.

I don't hand it over and I don't explain myself either, as my reasons should be pretty obvious. I don't want him acting as the bait.

"What are you doing?" He says impatiently.

I continue to ignore his demanding tone.

"Give it to me." He says again, and then he's cursing and grabbing my arm.

"You're going to make me spill."

"Stoppit." He says again, "Why are you so stubborn? Give it here before that thing shows up." He curls his hand around my bicep. "Dammit, give it to me." He's acting really antsy, more than usual. He looks around suddenly with a panicked expression. "He's coming, you idiot. C'mon."

Now I know he's not telling me something.

"You can see him, right?"

"Shizuka," he warns again. "He messed with your eye too, so maybe you can see him."

Why is he changing the subject?

"So where is he?"

"I don't know." Watanuki says curtly.

Wait, something isn't adding up here. "Then how do you know he's coming?"

He rubs his blind eye again and it's starting to both annoy and worry me.

"I can…" he rubs his eye again, "He can see us." Watanuki whispers and he's looking all around.

What is he talking about?

"How do you know that?"

"Look, just…" He stops, his hand still reaching out for the ladle. He then goes completely still, his eyes widening and I turn around to face whatever it is that has him so spooked.

Standing right above us is the spider.

I can actually see it.

It's huge.

"Give me the water." He says with a faked, brave tone and I can't take my eyes away from the spider that's probably bigger than my front door. It walks down the tree, all eight legs moving slowly and cautiously, like it takes some time for it to figure out which legs to move first.

"Shizuka!" Watanuki says impatiently. He's freaked out and I know there's another reason behind it other than the spider's proximity.

I just can't figure out what.

Something reflects the light of the moon above us and I turn my head in that direction only to see what looks like thin, silvery threads branching out from the dark Kuro-matsu tree, a net of it swaying in the gentle, cool breeze.

I put my hand out with the ladle and try to draw its attention.

It doesn't look like it notices me though.

It just continues to move forward slowly. I can hear each leaf and each branch its legs come into contact with. Its skinny, but large, black body gracefully scaling down the tree without snapping a branch.

It stops when it reaches the trunk of the tree, the large shadow overlapping us and making everything darker.

Watanuki suddenly covers his blind eye and hisses.

I put my hand on his shoulder.

I can't even tell if it's looking at me. Its eyes are too many and too small for me to count and keep track of. Watanuki's breathing has now grown heavy and he's freaking out for some unknown reason. I know he's seen weirder things before. A large house spider shouldn't be so shocking.

But something is clearly frightening Watanuki.

"Snap out of it." I tell him.

He's pale and he's sweating a little. His hand goes over his blind eye again as he swallows harshly. "I can see…what it sees. My eye…I'm looking through..."

He's not making any sense.

I push Watanuki to the side, because I don't want the spider to be confused between Watanuki and me. I want it to focus on me. I need it to focus on me; I need it to clearly see that I'm the one holding the ladle with the well water in my hand.

"C'mon," I say under my breath. "Look at me." I wish I could tell which direction it was looking in.

It slowly moves down the tree trunk, its legs finally touching down on the ground. I back away and prepare for it to come in my direction. Then out of nowhere it takes off and scurries towards…Watanuki!

It's going straight for him and not me, even though I have the water in my hand.

What…?

But Grandfather's notes had said it would come after the well water. It had said it would come after the well water.

_"Wash the missing eye socket with water. Then take the water… _

_And lure the **horuda uramigoto** into the very well… _

_Using the very same water." _

Wash the missing eye…with water…take the water…the very same water.

Take the very _same_ water…

Dammit, did it mean the water I'd used to cleanse Watanuki's eye?

Running forward, I toss the ladle away, grab Watanuki's hand and head in the direction of the well. I look back and sure enough it's still chasing after us. It was chasing after the well water that still clung to Watanuki's skin. It had never been after the ladle. I'd read this whole thing completely wrong.

I turn the corner and spotting the well, I notice immediately that my grandfather and Yuko-san were no longer around. But this wasn't the time to worry about that. I had to get that spider into the well.

"It's chasing after me." Watanuki says, and I turn around and catch the scared look on his face. I squeeze his hand.

"Don't worry." It was the only thing I could offer as comfort.

"It's chasing after _me_," he says again and suddenly I can feel his hand slipping out of my grasp. I look back just in time to see him rip his hand away from mine and time seems to slow down as I stumble forward without his hand.

"That thing is following me. I have to draw it into the well." His hand was still covering over his eye like it was hurting him, and he ran past me and in the direction of the well. I had to jump out of the way because the spider had charged right past me.

"Damn," I call after him. I hold my hand in **yugamae**, readying my spiritual bow for the shot.

"Don't shoot it!" Watanuki breathlessly yells at me as I reach **kai**, the full draw with everything lined up perfectly and I'm completely ready to unleash my spiritual energy.

He runs right towards the well and then he's jumping right on the ledge and turning around to face the spider.

I hold my shot and my breath, waiting for it to get within my sights.

It reaches him and Watanuki suddenly jumps back and the spider jumps forward, and instead of falling into the well as planned, his legs spread themselves out so he's hovering over the hole and not…in it. And compared to the size of the well hole, the spider is huge. I don't understand how we were supposed to get this thing into the well when he was so much bigger than it.

Watanuki was still standing in front of it and panic took over my limbs and I was suddenly firing the shot. It nailed him right in the thorax, his form warping, his body shriveling, and twisting, and evaporating into smoky, thin air.

We stare out blankly for a while.

"It's…dead." Watanuki says dazedly, breaking the silence that had built up around us. He turns towards me, "Is this…supposed to happen?"

I…don't know, so I don't answer back. I just walk over to the well and look down.

The book had said that the well water would turn white if the grudge was forgiven.

I put my hands on the edges of the well, and I stare down deeply into its abyss. The night has made it almost impossible to tell what the water looks like and I stick my head down the well, straining my eyes to see what color it is now.

"Oi, stop that." I hear Watanuki shout.

But I don't heed his warnings, because I'm too busy trying to figure out what we did wrong because the water's not white.

Watanuki, sensing my distress asks, "What's wrong?"

I lift my head out of the well and tell him quite frankly, "I think I messed up."

"What?" He asks again, and he's moving towards the well and looking down.

He gasps, "It's…red."

"Like blood."

* * *

**A/n: **Mwahahahaha. I like cliffies, I also like reviews so feedback appreciated. 

**Horuda-uramigoto:** Grudge-holder. I'm not even sure if it's correctly translated so I guess just take it as it is.

**Kuro-matsu:** Japanese black pine, I believe it's sacred. Although I'm not too sure, but it would make sense for the spider to take up residence there and it would also make sense for this tree to be in Doumeki's temple grounds.

There are seven different stages in Archery:

**Yugamae** is the first and it's readying the bow.

**Kai-** the sixth stage, which is the full draw, is when the archer is ready to release.


	11. Black Swallowtail, Black Widow

**A/n:** Thanks for all the reviews. They mean a lot and they always give me inspiration to continue on.

* * *

Watanuki looks over at me, a distressed expression that has all the hairs on the back of my neck standing up. He still places his palm over his right eye, the pale skin on the back of his hand glowing dully in the moonlight. 

We're still looking at each other, trying to figure out if this is a dream we're both trapped in, and if that illusion of the dream will disappear if we keep eye contact.

"Shizuka." He calls my name and I think I'll fall to pieces if he says it again, exactly like he just did, with not an ounce of held back emotion. "The water's not white. Does that mean the…?"

He has a desperate look on his face and he furrows between his eyebrows, like understanding will come to him with that gesture.

I suddenly grab his hand and it startles him.

"We're getting your eye back," I say resolutely, firmly. It's the only thing I can do. It's the only thing I can say and I don't want to see that somber expression on his face anymore. It's my fault. It's all my fault because he'd gotten his hopes up and now…he was being crushed by it.

"The spider can't be dead." I say to myself more than him. I want to desperately believe what I'm saying.

Watanuki removes the hand covering his eye and places it over mine. I take a deep breath. The palm of that hand is cold, not at all warm like the other and I wonder why, when its been in contact with the flesh of his face for all this time.

I raise my head, trying to catch his eyes and I stop, my breath catches in my throat and it's not because Watanuki looks like an angel in moonlight.

"Your…eye."

"What?" He asks and then his hand is reaching back to press against the sightless eye.

There's a…

I reach out with my fingers, my fingertips grazing the soft eyelid as it closes under my touch and I can see exactly what it is.

It's a butterfly. A black, swallowtail butterfly, the mark of it tattooed over his eye, like the pattern on many of Yuko's dresses.

He's suddenly pressing his palm to his other eye. "Dammit, what's going on?" He drops to his knees and I reach out for him, steadying his weight against my own. "My eye…it hurts."

_"That's what you get for disturbing the curse." _

A voice breaks the night, shatters it around us and I flinch up from Watanuki and wildly look around.

_"I'll take the other eye for this disgraceful affront done onto me." _

I can't tell where the voice is coming from and Watanuki's trembling in my arms. The hand that isn't covering his eye is gripping onto my sleeve and it flexes tightly, bunching up the material. I feel his tenseness through the gesture.

_"You humans. Why can't you suffer your punishment quietly? Why must you seek out trouble?"_

I throw my arm over Watanuki's shoulders. I don't care about finding where the voice is coming from; all I know is that I have to keep Watanuki here, safe with me.

_"It's not equal for the crime you've committed here. Slaying one of my own and then expecting to have all forgiven. I shouldn't just take another eye." _

My heart starts to beat faster and Watanuki makes a horrible, sobbing sound.

Everything suddenly goes black around us. Blacker than the night, the sounds of the cicada no longer chirping in the background, there's no rustling of trees and grass as the wind touches it. I can't smell the moss at my feet, or the wetness in the air.

It's pitch black.

Watanuki lifts his head and looks straight at me, but I know he's not seeing me, because his other eye, the good eye has now been changed to that icy, white color.

I swallow the lump in my throat.

It's not fair.

It's not fair.

Why does it keep taking from Watanuki? Why can't it take something from me?

I stand up, my hand still fastened around Watanuki's wrist and I call out. "You can hear me? If you can, come out."

No one answers.

I feel desperate, and angry and afraid. "I was the one who killed...him. I was the one who shot your friend."

The darkness around a certain spot in front of me suddenly shivers, like a pathway is opening and I see someone walk out.

It's a woman, dressed in a black kimono, a web pattern flowing through her clothing and over the lower portion of her face and neck, her black, thick hair touching the ground and winding a path behind her.

_"So you are the fool."_ It says bitterly.

_"You were the first to taste my grudge and now you demand seconds."_

I keep silent. The bitterness in its voice is plenty and choking. She looks down at Watanuki who's still bent over the waist, kneeling at my side, like in prayer.

_"You want to make amends. Well, it's too late to try and renounce any of this, so all you can to do is take your punishment and not run from it."_

I squeeze Watanuki's hand.

"What do I have to give you?" I ask and Watanuki seems to be coming back from his daze. He can't see anything, but he stares directly at me, in the direction of my voice and I don't want those eyes on me right now, reminding me of my sin.

_"You would give me anything human?"_ She says sounding suddenly amused. She looks down at Watanuki, who is lost and afraid and doesn't understand exactly what's going on. "All for this one?" She points a long, black fingernail at him. She lingers on the eye covered with the black butterfly and then shakes her head at me_. "I'm sorry, but I can't do that. Not when that woman is involved." _

Woman?

_"And not when I have finally found myself a butterfly." _

What was she talking about?

_"He will have to pay the price, because he is the only one that can. You have purity of soul, my child, but it is not enough, not in comparison to what this child holds. You may leave." _

"What?" I ask stupidly because I don't understand what she's saying. She wants me to leave? I…don't understand. Where would she have me go? My place is here…next to him. Where would I go?

I feel something crack. It hurts and I don't want to feel this way anymore. "Is it a soul? Do you need a soul?" Does she need a soul? I'll…

I feel the hand in my grasp tighten, but I ignore it and continue on.

"If you need one, I'll give it to you, but you…must promise to give back the things you've taken from him. Give Watanuki his eyes back."

I see Watanuki's eyes flash in terror and then he's clutching at my arm.

"No! Don't!" He can't see me, but he's clutching onto my arm, trying to seek out my face, trying to seek out my eyes and stare into them, even if blinded and even if he's putting up a semblance of control over his senses.

I feel something clench and shudder in my chest. It's gripping painfully, like I swallowed jagged ice and it's making its way down my throat and into my lungs and icing over the veins in my heart.

_"I'm sorry."_ She says again, and it's an uncomprehending statement that makes no sense to me at all.

She's sorry. She's sorry for what?

"If you would just tell me what you wanted…" Make a deal, flashes through my head. Promise her something that she couldn't say no to. Find something that you could give her.

Watanuki's not content to stand there, he grabs me by the arm again, harder and he screams at me. "You idiot! Stop this! What don't you understand by give up and go?" His voice is shaking and it sounds like he's about to cry and the only thing that's going through my head is that I'm about to make him cry.

"Anything. I'll give you anything." I say and the spider looks at me with something akin to...pity. There has to be something I can do? There's nothing that I can't offer.

Panic flares up in Watanuki and I want to tell him not to worry, that he'll get his eyes back. But he's shaking his head and his fingers are digging into my shoulder. "What's wrong with you? You can't make a promise like that! You can't!" He won't let go off my arm and I don't want to hear him talking like that, because this is my fault and I want to fix everything. He's still stubbornly clinging to my arm and trying to get me to answer him, and it's very distracting and I can't think about how I'm going to handle the spider with him like this. I need space to think things through and I unconsciously push him to the side. He stumbles a little and he makes such a pathetic sound that I have to violently suppress the urge to go to him.

I turn my gaze back to the woman, to the real spider, ready to offer up my life if it came to that, but she just shakes her head to the side and closes her eyes. _"No."_ She says finally, shockingly. It stops me from speaking and this time I stare at her balefully, remorsefully because I can't leave here, not without Watanuki, not without the things he's lost.

I'm angry and Watanuki reaches out his arms. He can't see and without someone by his side, he's even blinder. I pull him by the arm, right up against my chest so I can put my hand over his shoulders, where I'm half hugging him, half holding him up.

The woman puts her hand out and I can see each graceful unfurl of black fingers as she holds her hand out to me expectantly.

I look between her and myself and the space that exists there.

She holds out her hand more insistently.

_"Give him to me."_

And it finally hits me that this thing doesn't care what I have to offer. It only cares about the trap it's weaved and the reasons behind those traps and the person in my arms.

Watanuki is pushing away from me a little…like he wants to go to her. I crush him against me. I can feel him flinch and whimper and I don't care if I'm hurting him, because I can't let go.

_"Give him to me."_ It says again and as I watch this thing, this creature, this tiny god that exists in its own universe and is bound to countless laws that I do not understand or try to. As I watch it pull in the webs that link its world together, that trap all that enter into its domain, as I watch it, graceful, and poised, and deadly, and perfect my head seems to get clearer and clearer until only the sound of Watanuki's breathing sweeps into my ear.

I let go of Watanuki's shoulders.

He breathes out.

I let go of his hand altogether.

The creature favors me with a nod.

I draw my hand in the signature of my bow; my hands finally free to move of their own accord without Watanuki's presence clouding them.

And the creature stares at me like a parent would with a spoiled child, with unfettered disgust at my selfishness. I can't blame it. I know I'm being selfish and that I'm willingly ready to destroy anything and everything to get what I want, to make Watanuki happy again, because his happiness is my own.

_"You…insolent!"_

It's angry and I can't blame it for that because it's practically a god and I'm about to kill a god.

Watanuki can sense something amiss, but I'm glad for the moment he cannot see, that he cannot see what I'm about to do.

_"You wretched thing! Shoot me and the curse will come down on you threefold. Do not think I am the only one!_

Watanuki seems to get it, but he can't stop me, because he can't see me.

"Don't!" He begs and I don't hear him anymore because the sound of the spirit arrow being released and the tremendous flow of energy that goes with it deafens me for the split second needed to slaughter a god.

**……………………………………………………………………………………………… **

There's blood, enough that I could drown in it.

It hadn't cried out. It had just bled…a lot. Watanuki can feel it washing up by his feet, he cringes and I hear him contain a sob.

He knows what I just did. I know what I just did. I have no regrets.

And to drive the point home, the mark of a black widow etches into the skin on the back of my palm, branching across my knuckles and twisting the flesh a little. I don't tell Watanuki about it, because this is my punishment for disobeying a god.

I'm going to be punished for this.

"Shizuka?" He's calling out to me and there was never a moment in my time with Watanuki that I could resist going towards him.

I wrap him up in my arms and squeeze and it's desperate and not romantic, because I'm desperate and I need to figure out if this is real. I can't think. I don't know what to think and it's the desperation and the ache of helplessness that makes me mutter the next words in the tendrils of his hair. "Tell me you love me."

He cries.

I'm stupid.

I made him cry again and it's worst than the first time I'd done it those weeks ago, when I had just confronted him.

I wasn't supposed to make him cry again.

Not like this.

I was breaking my promise.

I was breaking everything.

His heart included.

* * *

**A/n:** Dark and angsty. Such a turn around from my pervious chapters, but this is the last stretch, so I plan to go out with a bang. In Japan, nature is held in high regard and I thought since this spider is apart of the scheme of nature, it would make sense to make it a kami, since they have an infinite number of those. A spider god, why not? Not anything major, but in its world, it's pretty much the creator and the destroyer. I guess you'll see where I'm going with this train of thought in the next chapter. 


	12. The Debt Collecting Spider

**A/n:** Thanks for all the support and reviews. Things are getting hectic, so my writing schedule is getting narrow, but I will try to get the next chapter out on time, the key word here is _try_.

* * *

That damn spider… 

It had predicted we would try to break the curse and had sent a doppelganger after us, a replacement, just to throw us off and make it that much easier for it to get its claws into Watanuki.

I hadn't expected it to do something like that.

And the only thing that came to mind when I thought back on it was Yuko and the knowing smile she had flashed at me while I was walking away. Had she predicted this? It wouldn't surprise me…but then why did she not say anything? Why didn't she warn Watanuki?

Yuko surely didn't want Watanuki to get hurt…

But then why?

_"…__but keep in mind, that this spider is not to be trifled with. It will eventually find out what you are trying to do and it will come for penance. And when that time comes Shizuka, I will not be able to help you. Even if you are my dear grandson." _

_"…I will not be able to help you." _

Was…was that it? Was that the reason why Yuko hadn't warned Watanuki, because she couldn't? She couldn't get involved? She was just the wish giver, not the helper, or the aid this time around…

And I had to remember that this was _my_ wish. I couldn't come to her for anything. She had banished me from her shop—in kinder words—but nonetheless, banished.

This wasn't Watanuki's wish. I had set all of this in motion with my own doing and stupidity. I hadn't had the foresight to see the outcome of my actions. I hadn't had the intuition to interpret the words in the spell correctly…

_Horuda uramigoto_ meant grudge holder. It was specific. It had never said anything about a damn spider and that woman had not taken the form of a spider. It had been me depending on my eyes, my flawed eyes. I couldn't see ghost like Watanuki, but when I had seen that spider climbing down the pine tree in my front yard, I'd forgotten for a second about that fact. What was the reason I could see the spider had never crossed my mind and now I was regretting it, because that stupid thing had purposefully let me see it. Had led me on and baited me into all my thoughtless actions.

…stupid!

I'm pulling him by the hand, my pace fast and focused, as I do not want to further give myself the chance to remember where I am, what I've just done, who I'm with, who I've broken in a tiny, but not unimportant way.

I hate this feeling.

I hate how disorientated I feel.

So I pull Watanuki harder and he stumbles behind me, because I've increased my pace.

I don't know how long I've been walking.

I don't know much.

I just want an entrance to open up before me. Anything, even if it's the gateway to hell, right now I would rather that over the bleak, black silence of this place that weighs down on me like stone.

It's too quiet.

I can't even hear our footsteps, but only our combined breathing. Mine is sharper than his, quicker, because I'm panicking and I just want to get out of here.

"Shizuka." Watanuki says my name and it's enough to knock me out of my daze. I turn around and stare at him, and I have to beat down the urge to look at the floor, because Watanuki's looking directly at me and it hurts to see my failure reflected in those white, marble-like eyes. He puts his hand on my shoulder and it feels cold, just as cold as the mute white in his gaze. "I don't know what the hell is going on here," his voice cracks, "but we have to figure a way out of this…I..." He gives up and rubs at his eyes harshly, as if his eyesight will come back with that gesture. "This is so…"

Unfair, cruel, fucked up…

My mouth already has enough words to describe this situation, but when I reach for them, they scatter under my touch and I end up speechless with no words of comfort or reassurance.

I'm so useless.

Watanuki squeezes the shoulder under his palm and slips his other hand under my neck, trying to coax me in a hug that I'm all to ready to accept. I practically fall into him with a sigh and he pets my hair and doesn't say anything. And I'm thankful, I'm finally thankful for the silence and I just want to stay here and not have to think about anything, but the way Watanuki's fingers comb through my hair and the secure hold around my shoulders.

I close my eyes, not even trying to bring my arms around Watanuki's own shoulders, my hands dangling uselessly at my sides and all I want is for Watanuki to hold onto me.

"Are you hungry?" Watanuki says, quietly and in my ear.

"Mmhmm." I answer, because I am a bit hungry now that I think about it and tired. I want to fall asleep. I just want to go to sleep right here, with Watanuki warmly cradling me and nothing but the silence wrapping around us.

"When we get back I'll make you something." Watanuki says, and the only words I can focus on in that sentence are _when we get back… _

Watanuki still believes…

He still believes that we aren't trapped here, with him sightless and me numb to everything but his touches.

I want to believe, but it's so hard and all my faith seemed to have left me when I'd shot my arrow into that woman…that spider. I know, that if I start believing, I'm going to want to make another promise, and eventually I'm going to end up breaking that promise and hurting Watanuki even more than I already have.

Watanuki draws himself away from me, walking forward on his own, and it surprises me as I wonder after him. I know he can't see, and I know there isn't anything that he'll run into, but still…it makes me uneasy.

I forget sometimes that Watanuki is so much stronger than me. He understands what suffering is. He's seen things that I can't comprehend, but can only limitedly share with him through his experiences. He knows more about life than he lets on and I know so little and yet that doesn't stop me from being pompous and spouting on about things.

My grandfather's always seen that and he's warned me about it. He's warned me about my sheltered life and about my decisions that may seem altruistic but are more selfish in turn.

I've never had things to bear and drag behind me. Not like Watanuki and for a second I had wanted his burden, I had wanted it as much as I had wanted him. I had thought it would be easy to protect him, to let him turn to me and let me comfort him. I thought that if I had pestered him enough, if I stuck by him, he would notice me and love me and that I could give him every single thing that he had dreamed of.

I would give him his freedom from the ghost plaguing him and I thought proudly that he would love me more for it. That he wouldn't--couldn't leave me because I was his savior. I wasn't even considering the bigger picture, or the fact that something could come in and disrupt my plans, my dreams, my egocentric wishes…

I see Watanuki reach his hands out in front of him, like he's finally bumped up against the walls in this place. I notice his fingers and how the tips are no longer visible, the area in front of him seeming to give under his steady prodding, the black inkiness suddenly encompassing one of his pale arms up to the elbow.

**……………………………………………………………………………………………… **

It's undeterminable minutes later, and we've passed through the black, glob of wall and entered into a strange white room, pebbles crunching under our feet and a twisted pine tree and an almost slanted **1.**torii off in the distance.

The room on closer inspection is actually a bared landscape, the sky completely white, like a god had wiped his hand across the sky and created a blank slate on which to draw life.

It almost looks like a painting.

"Where are we?" Watanuki asks, and since he can't see anything, I know his question is more interested in a description.

"I wouldn't know where to start," I answer, and he makes a grab for my hand. He notices the crunching sound at his feet and he makes a weird face.

"It's not bones." I say just to let him know.

He doesn't say anything and I don't say anything either, even when I do actually spot the skull of a skeleton resting near a pike jammed into the ground of what looks to me like a normal rock garden. The path winding like a river, and the scenery looking like it had just been raked and maintained. It was serene, and disquieting and beautiful in its own morbid way, the crows flying above us and circling our position wherever we went.

I can still see the torii and I walk towards it, because if there was ever a good sign to the grandson of a priest, it would have to be this, the red, oaken wood standing out drastically against the backdrop of pure white. I don't alert Watanuki to anything as I silently pass through the structure, but he almost immediately notices the atmosphere change, something like a sixth sense firing off like nerve synapses.

There was a rosebush two feet from where we were standing, spread out like a dress on a bed of verdant linen, the flowers so bright that you could see the dew on each rose petal and smell its too sweet fragrance.

Watanuki wrinkles his nose. "What is that?"

If I didn't know better, I'd think we stepped into the setup for a Renaissance play, the scenery a cultured reflection of one of those Italian villa gardens that always served to be good rendezvous spots between lovers in poetry.

It was so picturesque it was scary. The weather clear and blue, the sun shining, but hidden away, like a shy face draped in a veil. It had to be somewhere here, maybe hidden behind one of the little pavilions that dotted the garden in random. There were at least ten that I could make out from where I was standing; ornamental walls fluting out and curtsying like a lady. I noticed there wasn't a main house only Gazebos and enough garden space too stretch on for unseen miles.

There was a terraced walkway winding and hitching up and down, lined with red roses, like someone had taken a paint brush dipped in blood and had swept their peripheral while they walked. There were benches dotting the same path, white wood curling in vine motifs and a water fountain that could be reached by climbing over a hill.

This was where I made Watanuki sit; right on the ledge so I could figure out in which direction I should head toward. The running water seemed to ease some tension in me; a white, stone sculpture of a woman with a harp was seated in the middle, the water coming from her mouth, as she opened it in accompaniment to her playing. There were water clovers and hyacinths, and a weird, red colored fish that I had never seen before but seemed to have made itself at home in the beatifully decorated fountain.

"I would ask you where we are, but I have a feeling you'd just say it wasn't important." Watanuki chimes out and he was bracing his arms behind him, almost looking like another beautifully arranged sculpture that belonged to the water fountain.

"You'd probably laugh if I told you," I answer back, reaching out for his hand and pulling him to his feet.

"Why would I"--I notice that Watanuki's eyes go wide and that he's looking over my shoulder and at something that's caught his attention. I turn around and I see the funny bobbing of a head, as someone makes their way up the small slope that we'd taken to get here.

"Hello there!" It calls out, and what was standing in front of us, wasn't a spider, but a boy that looked to be around our age dressed in a black waistcoat and trousers. A **2.**cravat slung around his neck.

"You two are harder to catch up with than I'd have thought, but hmm…" He trails off and one of his white-gloved hands, make a dismissive gesture as if he's lost his train of thought.

I take one good look at him and then pull Watanuki forward in an attempt to get away from whatever _this_ was.

"Hey, none of that." He says and I can hear him following closely behind us, his black, polished shoes tapping the stone path. "You don't think you can run from me so easily, do you?" He asks teasingly and I continue to ignore him as he follows.

"Please leave us alone." I tell him, the tone of my voice not really asking, so much as telling.

"That's a bit thick-headed, isn't it?" He poses and his gaze is as red as the roses that had dotted the path near the bench. "I can't simply do as you say. I have a job to complete here. You think it's easy in the debt collecting business." When he sees that I'm not really paying him any attention, he adds, "Damn you persistent types are my least favorite."

He then grabs onto Watanuki's wrist, walking in the other direction like I'm not even holding onto the other hand.

I yank at Watanuki's hand and the boy comes up short. He looks at his bare hands. "You're making this more difficult than it should be. I'm not like the dearly departed Missy Black Widow." He glances at the mark on the back of my hand, and then quite obnoxiously he makes another attempt to grab onto Watanuki's wrist.

I tug Watanuki out of reach and step in front of him. The boy looks me right in the eye and then laughs, "I won't just bow out because you shoot some measly cupid arrows at me. We all have our place here, and you've disrupted it well and good enough. It's time for payment. We spirits have needs to, yuh know." And he walks right up to my face with a grin, his hand suddenly shooting right past me and grabbing onto Watanuki again.

And before I could even think properly, my own hand, my own clenched hand shoots out and I deck him solidly in the face.

He stumbles backwards and using that time wisely, I grab onto Watanuki's hand again and take off in the other direction; behind me I can hear his enraged shouts of "You arrogant bastard!"

Watanuki, who was probably well aware of what I'd just done by the shouting and the noises of the skirmish, holds onto my hand with the equal force that I was caging in his. I look behind me and even though I shouldn't have been, I was surprised that the "debt collector" was chasing after us. The anger on his face apparent, even from the distance we had on him and suddenly, like in a nightmare, I could see something like black spider legs unfurling from his back, four pairs of them, long and sharp-looking and framing his body like wings.

Well that answered the question as to what he was.

We run over another hill, but I was met with something that discouraged me to a jog.

I stop in front of a black, iron gate that takes off for what looks like miles and miles on either side of me. The vine designs on it looking like they would be useful footholds. Quickly ducking down--due to time constraints--I grab Watanuki around the waist and lift. He was startled, but I didn't give too much consideration to that.

"There's a gate in front of you. Grab onto it and jump over." I say, looking behind me to see that the spider was already making his way over the hill.

Watanuki did as was told, his feet slipping off the foothold only once, before connecting again.

The boy hadn't even waited, but had instantly charged into me, my back hitting into the gate and upsetting Watanuki's balance, but thankfully with him falling over and landing on the other side. I could see that his hands had braced him from a nasty fall.

"Go." I say, and the thing in front of me has caged me in on either side with the black spider legs that had sprouted from his back. He bares menacing fangs at me and I shove my forearm under his neck and use all the strength in my upper body to keep those sharp teeth away from my head.

"Shizuka!" Watanuki calls out and he's right behind me. His fingers clutching the fence and his eyes unseeing, but his ears attuned to the clanging of the gate and my harsh breathing as I try to fight this thing off.

"Go. Just keep going. I'll catch up with you."

"But I can't just leave yo-

"Go!" I shout and I can hear his hesitant feet and the way they were shuffling over the ground, not wanting to take another step forward and stuck helplessly to his spot.

"I'll catch up with you. I promise!" I say and finally my words are enough to sway him, the sounds of his footfalls becoming lighter and lighter as he runs in the other direction towards unknown territory.

**

* * *

****A/n: **So yeah, I guess I'm sticking in my own make believe characters, because bad guys are fun and when they get to mess with the "heroes" in the story, it makes for a better day in my book. That makes me sound like a nice little psycho. Please ignore that last part and if you have anything to say about this chapter, reviews much appreciated. 

**1.**torii-traditional Japanese gate, commonly found at the entry to a Shinto shrine. It has two upright supports and two crossbars on the top, and is frequently painted vermilion.

**2.**cravat- let's see, the predecessor to the tie I'd say. Worn probably around the time of the Renaissance, which is a big hint as to what fashionable period Mr. Spider # two is mimicking.

All definitions ripped shamelessly from Wikipedia, because I'm lazy and Wikipedia is a writer's friend.


	13. Determined Moth

**A/n:** I'm doing this chapter in third person, as it switches perspective between Watanuki and Doumeki. Sorry for the lateness, but I'm swamped.

* * *

"He can run, but I'll catch up to him easy enough. Did you forget that he's blind?" 

"He won't let himself be caught that easily."

"Oh, aren't you just the supportive boyfriend."

Doumeki could feel the dig of sharp fingernails bite into his collarbone, the spider's face distorting into a gleeful smile as he pressed him into the fence and trapped him even further.

"You better start worrying about yourself." The spider warned, the black and thin spider legs inching closer to his face as he squirmed away from the sharp tips. "You're going to be just as blind as him if my claws get into you." It said, snapping noises accompanying that threat.

Doumeki was hit by a burst of sudden energy. May it be fright for his life, fright for Watanuki's or both, he was able to shove the spider away with his forearm. The momentary break, just what he needed, as the spider rushed forward to corner him again but was met with his foot, as he planted it firmly in its midsection and kicked it away.

It fell backwards and he scaled the gate without a moment's thought, his fingers burning from the feel of the iron under his skin as he twisted clumsily over the obstacle. As soon as his feet hit the ground, he had took off in a run, not even looking behind him to take note of the spider's position. He only had one thought, one need coursing through his head. It was the need to find Watanuki and the need to get away from the spider.

**

* * *

**

Watanuki stumbled against something that was blocking his path, his palms feeling blindly over the smooth, glass surface, and not at all comprehending why there seemed to be a huge glass wall in front of him.He felt his chest go hot with panic. What if this was some kind of trap and he had walked right into it? And what had happened to Doumeki? That idiot…he had been so stubborn to the end. God, he wished he had stayed behind. Even if it would have angered Doumeki, he would have just had to deal with it and…

Watanuki pounded against the glass, a hollow thumping sound resembling the one in his chest.

He should go back. He should go back and try to find Doumeki and make sure he was all right. Make sure…

He was blind. Blind as a bat and couldn't even make it back if he wanted to. He had just ran in one direction when Doumeki had shouted at him and he had not thought about anything else, but that stupid driving voice, foolishly reassuring him that everything would be fine and that he would find him. They would see each other again.

Why wasn't Doumeki here? He'd promised him.

Watanuki feeling up against the boundaries in front of him, walked without caution to his left. He'd already fallen so many times that the threat of reliving more bruises and cuts on his hands and knees didn't faze him.

He kept to his scuttle across the wall and his foot finally brushed up against something. He put his hand out and felt the wispy ends of what seemed to be a houseplant, the pot that it was kept in shook when he tapped his foot against it, the soil scratching around in the container.

He crossed over it and suddenly his gut connected with something cool and smooth. It was jamming him in the stomach and it didn't take long to figure out that it was the handle to the door. He grabbed onto it and it opened easily enough, permitting him easy entry into whatever lay beyond.

It was one thing to be chased, but to be chased without his eyes to help guide him, to warn him made the experience terrifying. His heart felt like it would mangle him in his chest if it beat any faster, the pulse in his neck beating like a butterfly and making his skin tingle, as his fingertips brushed over the unknown surfaces of this place. Everything felt grainy and dusty, and he could hear the distinctive sounds of crickets chirping somewhere over his head. He could even feel sunlight warming one side of his shoulder, where the material of his shirt had slipped down and exposed a corner of his neck. Even though he had entered into a building, it still very much felt like he was outside, his feet knocking against potted plants and flowers, the sound of flowing water and the buzz of insects giving him a good idea as to where he was.

It seemed that he had walked right into a greenhouse, a pretty big greenhouse since he had been walking for some time, tripping up here and there, and bumping into shelves that held more plant life.

He heard something rustle and he automatically ducked down, his hands going over his head. He scooted over when he felt his knees brush over a shelf. His ears registering with him that whoever this was, they were coming towards him and if he called out right now, like he wanted to, if he called out Doumeki's name then there was a chance that Doumeki would answer back. Although there was also a chance that someone entirely else would answer back and that he would not like the response. He swallowed the yelp in his throat, pressed his body down to the floor and crawled under the low shelf next to him. He closed his eyes tightly, even though it wouldn't make a difference either way. He bit his lip to keep his breathing from overwhelming him and pressed his face into the crook of his elbow. Whoever was moving through the greenhouse had abruptly stopped on the side of where he was hiding. He hoped that he hadn't chosen a place that could be easily seen from the side. His hands had brushed up against plants, so his saving grace would have to be the heavily leafed ornaments and their sprawling reach over everything. He hoped they covered him well.

The person wasn't moving from where they were standing and Watanuki felt panic course through his vein like liquid ice. Doumeki would have called out to him, not stayed quiet.

He heard the feet moving away and he continued to stay under the shelf, his knuckles gripping his shirtsleeve as he tried to calm his racing heart down. He could hear the glass door of the greenhouse open and then close with a click.

Knowing that he needed to move and find a way out of here, he began to drag himself from under the shelf, his hands reaching out, his fingers suddenly grazing against something that hadn't been there before.

It was…cobwebs.

**

* * *

**

"Watanuki."

He didn't care if that thing could hear him, if Watanuki heard him, then it would have all been worth it.

"Watanuki."

But the other boy was nowhere in sight as Doumeki walked through another courtyard, gazebos still dotting the landscape.

There'd been two directions to go in. What if Watanuki had chosen the other way and was hiding out there…

He should head over there right now…but what if Watanuki was here and he was just hiding out in one of these gazebos, waiting for him to come get him. Watanuki wouldn't chance calling out, or he hoped Watanuki wouldn't chance it. Not in his condition.

He'd stay quiet--hopefully--so it was up to Doumeki to find him. If he thought about it like a game of _kakurenbo_, then his heart might not hurt him so much.

Doumeki, looking into one of the gazebos couldn't stop his relief from flooding over him when he saw the white of Watanuki's shirt peeking out from the side of another gazebo.

"Watanuki." He called and he stepped inside the gazebo, his heart dropping when he realized that it was Watanuki's shirt, but the owner wasn't anywhere near. Then something hit him as hard as bricks in the back of the skull. Watanuki wouldn't just leave his shirt here…

He bolted out of the gazebo and suddenly the inside ignited, like a switch had been triggered. He watched it char and burn, his nose filling with the scent of smoking wood.

"That was a pretty good trap, wasn't it?"

The spider was back. His smiling face poking out of a gazebo at Doumeki's side, as he walked out of it casually, but Doumeki's eyesight wasn't on him, as he saw Watanuki, his body made to sit on the bench in the gazebo, something that looked like cobweb restraining his hands and legs. The cobwebs also plastered over his stomach and chest and stuck to the surface behind him, so he was tied down to the gazebo. A wisp of it was clinging to his mouth so to effectively restrain any noise that he could make.

Doumeki tried to move towards him, but a dangerous swipe from one of the black legs protruding from the spider's back and he had to rethink that strategy. He got his bow ready and aimed his spiritual projectile at the spider.

The spider leaped back and landed right on the handrail of one of the gazebos, his body hunched over as he stooped there and looked like a spring ready to jump forward. "I gave you the option of leaving, but now you don't have that option anymore."

Doumeki released his arrow and it shot through the air like a sparrow cutting an arc in the sky. The spider leaped out of the way and the arrow sliced through one side of the gazebo, the wood splitting like hairs.

Watanuki squirmed in his restraints and Doumeki tried not to focus on how scared he looked. He stretched back his bow and released another shot, and the spider dodged it by jumping to the side. He released one after the other, his hands tingling with the sensation of spiritual energy leaving his body in mass amounts. He could almost taste it on his tongue, the feeling vibrating on the back of his neck.

The arrows whooshed through the air and the spider was made to leap around like a puppet, almost looking like a puppeteer was tugging fast on his strings. His body bent in all directions, his limbs flailing out as he came back down to earth and crouched, readying himself to dodge another round of shots.

Doumeki's brow was covered in sweat. He'd never done successive attacks. Usually it only took one arrow, but not with this thing. He had to restrain his movements somehow and fast, before he lost out to fatigue. But the spider, not waiting for him to take offensive again, threw out webs. Doumeki, dodging them by the fraction of a hair, tried again to come around the spider and make it over to the gazebo that kept Watanuki prisoner. However the spider flung his legs out, one sharp end catching Doumeki by the cheek and the shoulder. Blood splattered against the lawn, the dark red complementing the blades of grass.

The spider didn't look like he wanted to back away yet, and he dove at him, his legs spearing out and one going right through Doumeki's side, the instant pain flaring up and sizzling on his nerve endings. Doumeki bit back a pained grunt, his body being pulled forward of the spider's accord, as it tugged him closer through the gap of his wound. He winced and blood was pouring out of his side, like it would never stop.

"Dead human, that's what you're about to be." The spider grimaced, the disgust apparent in his face as he sneered down at him. That mocking smile no longer in place, but pure hatred.

Doumeki coughed and felt his chest heave like it wanted to upload his lunch.

"Coming into nature's territory. Did you really expect anything less? You think that curse is just gonna go away if the grudge-holder dies. The only way that grudge is getting lifted is by the will of the grudge holder, nothing more, nothing less. You can try to kill me, but even if I did die, that grudge will just pass to another spider and then what, stupid human. What are you going to do then?"

Doumeki despite the bleeding and the suffocating words stood straighten, his hands catching the spider off guard and forming into his bow stance. The spider's eyes widened, as it had not expected that he would have enough strength, or even be conscious enough through all the blood loss to raise his hands.

"I'll rip through you." The spider warned. "Like you have enough energy to-"

The spider watched the meshes of energy unravel and gradually build themselves around Doumeki's form, the light becoming the shape of an arrow.

"Have you forgotten what position you're in?" The spider said. Its voice more high pitched than usual.

Doumeki didn't answer, just strengthened his foothold.

"You can't!" The spider's eyes went wild as it watched Doumeki take position. "I'll rip right through you before you can even-"

"At point blank range, I'll still kill you." Doumeki said, his voice clear and direct as ever.

"But I'll just turn around and kill you too." The spider shot back, like that was supposed to deter him.

Doumeki nodded his head. "So be it."

He pulled back the spiritual arrow in the bow, until there was pressure winding along the muscles in his forearm and the spider flinched so hard Doumeki felt it through the wound in his side.

"You can't actually be serious?"

Doumeki didn't say anything.

"Even after telling you all those things, you're not going to kill me, are you? It would be pointless. It would be more than pointless."

"Then raise the grudge." Doumeki said.

"I can't do that."

"But you said you could. The grudge passed onto you, so remove it."

"I--what the hell is wrong with you? I'm about to kill you and you're still worrying about a grudge that's not even been placed on you. Does that…does that boy mean so much to you that you'd risk your life like this?"

"Yes."

The spider gave Doumeki an exasperated look. "So you'll just die and be alright with that?"

"Yes."

The spider sighed, "Oh man I wasn't expecting this. Persistent souls like you always turn into revenging ghosts when you die and I sure as hell don't want you hanging around here when that happens."

"I guess I'll haunt you forever then." Doumeki said, his face still very serious, his hands filled with the intent to release his arrow.

"Shit." The spider looked less than thrilled about this prospect. "I'm not going to be taken down by some human…but I don't want to be stuck with a ghost plaguing me for my entire existence."

"Remove the curse then." Doumeki provided.

The spider shook his head. "I can't do that. There's a balance to these things. I'd have to give something in return and well…that's not going to happen."

"Can't I pick up the slack for you?" Doumeki again provided and winced, because the spider's sharp leg was still puncturing his side.

"You could…but do you-"

"Yes." Doumeki said, not giving it a thought. Only seeing a way out of this.

The spider gave him a strange look. "Alright then. If you…you could die, you know?"

"Doesn't matter." Doumeki answered.

"I thought so." The spider closed his eyes and the air got suddenly suffocating. Doumeki given no choice, but to stand there and withstand the rancid winds. He could almost taste sulfur in the air.

The spider opened his eyes slowly, blinking wearily, his face an utter mask.

"You smell that? That's the backlash for doing something stupid, like removing a grudge before its run its full course. That's the makings of another grudge, a curse against the grudge holder. I'll be needing something from you to cleanse it."

"What?" Doumeki asked. Ready and willing to give anything and everything to be rid of this nightmare.

"Blood." The spider said, his eyes hardening and without a second's hesitation, the spider ripped his leg through Doumeki's side. Doumeki collapsed to the floor in a daze, his side burning fiercely and his lungs feeling like they would give out on him soon from the pain. His eyesight was blurred and getting hazier with each passing moment, but before he could pass out, he could hear the far off call of his name from a familiar voice.

**

* * *

A/n:** Next chapter will be the last. I'll try to get it out on time. Also Kakurenbo means hide and seek. 


	14. Happily Ever After?

_The first thing he noticed was that there was something warm and moving pressing up against his side. He heard the rustle of bed sheets, heard someone breathing other than himself, and heard the whistle of wind as it moved outside the paper sliding doors._

_He moved his hand experimentally, the one that was currently being hugged to someone's chest and then stopped when that person shifted and started to sit up._

_He opened his eyes._

_Watanuki was looking down at him with the bluest colored eyes he had ever seen in his life._

"_Yogatta." Watanuki sighed, as his eyes shuddered close and he was leaning down on him, nuzzling his neck and bringing his arms around and gently, very gentle placing them on his shoulder._

_Doumeki, feeling out of the loop, could only lie there and accept the touches and embrace. His brain felt fuzzy and it wasn't clear to him why he was getting this treatment from Watanuki, but the fact that he was and it was purposefully directed at him was really, really cool in his opinion. _

_Watanuki stroked the side of his face and kissed his neck, the warm tip of his nose pressing into his skin and causing goose bumps to travel down his arm._

_His side was hurting him; a stinging pain that made him want to brush his fingers over it to see how much damage was done. But then again, if an injury had caused Watanuki to be so sweet to him, then he couldn't complain. If anything, he should get injured more often, because the 'get well better' treatment from Watanuki was surely one hell of a reward._

_Watanuki murmured something against his throat, his warm palms smoothing up his back and rubbing him like he trying to soothe a child back to sleep._

_Ah, the good life. _

_Watanuki with another small, incoherent murmur, lips running their course over his jaw came towards his mouth. Watanuki pressed his lips against his and before he knew it they were kissing. Then they were having sex, which delighted the hell out of him._

_But something wasn't sitting too well with him. He doesn't remembering undressing Watanuki, but somehow they just ended up naked on the floor, which was all fine and good, but still you'd think he'd remember. It is his favorite part after all…well one of his favorite parts. _

_Everything just felt so disjointed and…_

_Oh, someone was shaking him._

"Wake up! Shizuka, you yarou! Wake up!"

Someone was shaking him the clutch of his yukata, and Doumeki opening his eyes was suddenly met with the…angriest, narrowest stare he had ever seen.

"Is this hell?" He hadn't meant to say it, but it had come out, along with more shouting and shaking. He closed his eyes and tried to go back to sleep, because maybe if he went back to sleep, maybe he'd get to continue having sex with Watanuki and all would be right in the world and…

"Don't go back to sleep." Watanuki's voice had jumped out at him then. He realized that this was Watanuki waking him up and that his voice sounded hoarse, and desperate, and beautiful.

"Please. Just don't." Watanuki had stopped shaking him and with Doumeki's eyes fully open now and the room no longer rocking back and forth, he could plainly see the tear streaks down his face, his eyes red-rimmed and deep blue.

This vision of those blue eyes made him snap back into cognizance. Everything coming back to him in an instant as he continued to stare in Watanuki's eyes. He opened his mouth to say something, and the first thing that came out wasn't a question of concern about if Watanuki could see and if he was all-better, but something much simpler.

"They're pretty."

They were so pretty. He'd forgotten how pretty Watanuki's eyes were.

"Oh, you idiot." Watanuki had said, and he had slumped against his chest, his cheek resting against where his heart lay underneath. Watanuki shifted his head and his nose was poking him in the chest. "You idiot." And even though his voice was muffled Doumeki could hear the sadness and joy there. "Why do you have to be such an idiot? You could have gotten yourself killed…and then what…" He heard Watanuki sniff, "Then I'd have another ghost following me around and I…" His fingers grasped onto the yukata that he had changed Doumeki into while the other boy had been passed out.

"I'm hungry." Doumeki said, his stomach feeling empty, but his chest suddenly feeling surprisingly full. Watanuki lifted his head and wiped at the corner of an eye with the back of his palm. He nodded his head.

"Of course you're hungry. You're always hungry." Watanuki smiled and buried his face in Doumeki's chest, effectively hiding the expression in the folds of the boy's yukata.

"I want eggs."

Watanuki's shoulders shook. "Let me guess, a pterodactyl egg? Or maybe an ostrich egg?" He raised his head and smiled the sweetest, most contented smile that Doumeki was quite certain could both do away with world hunger and all the general unhappiness in the world.

"No, just a plain chicken egg." Doumeki answered accordingly, as they continued to stare at each other, like it was the only they could do.

That was, until Yuko-san crisply slid the door open and let herself in.

"I was just checking his temperature." Watanuki supplied quickly.

"There's such a thing as a thermometer, Watanuki." Yuko said, that knowing smile plastered all over her face.

"Well this is a temple…I don't know if-

"Second shelf from the top behind my bathroom mirror." Doumeki replied helpfully.

"Never mind." Watanuki didn't look Yuko-san in the face again for a few minutes.

"What happened to me?" He asked Yuko, and even though she hadn't been there, it was more than likely that she knew more than he did on these matters.

"You made a deal with that spider, a most profitable deal if I have to judge this by the outcome." She looked at Watanuki. "He took a lot of blood, but you're lucky the blood that runs through your veins is the kind that can suppress spiritual essence and not draw them out, like Watanuki's." She passed her hand over the hem of her cheongsam and returned his gaze. "He was able to disperse of the grudge with the blood he took from you."

Doumeki nodded his head, not really in acceptance of any of the things Yuko-san was saying, but more like…where were his eggs?

He looked at Watanuki. "I'm hungry."

Watanuki rolled his eyes and padded towards the door with a sigh.

When Doumeki was sure Watanuki was no longer within hearing range, he turned towards Yuko. The woman's face not changing, even though the tone of her voice gave way to slight inflection and when he said slight, he meant it. "You were lucky. I'll tell you that much, and when your grandfather said you were hardheaded, I think it was an understatement."

He didn't say anything back.

"We could not help you, even if we wanted too, but you already knew that."

He nodded.

Yuko leaned back on her palms and looked up at the ceiling. "He's no longer my property." She said almost wistfully. "I can't interfere in your life, since you do not exist within my world Doumeki." Something about this sentence sent a small tingling sensation down his spine. "You're not a wisher Doumeki. You take actions and that's why you can't come into my store. Watanuki's fate is now entwined within yours and as such, I don't have as much sway with his life circle anymore. Gradually he's leaving the shop and one day, I know he won't have a use for it." Yuko said this as plain as day, like she was recounting the weather forecast and the report said they were having gloomy skies.

"So then, does he belong to me?" Doumeki asked and he couldn't keep the small smile of his face.

Yuko made a 'hmm' sound like she was thinking it over. "No human being will ever belong to another," she said matter-of-factly, which messily burst Doumeki's happy bubble. "But," she added, "A man can wish, or he can take action."

She smiled at him; a slow upturn of the mouth and Doumeki was again reminded that this woman was not someone you wanted to make an enemy out of. He was glad she was on his side.

"Shizuka." He heard his grandfather call his name and come through the door, someone following behind him. "You have a guest."

"Hi Doumeki." Kunogi waved at him. A week had passed in the real world. She'd bought him a get-well present when she heard the news from Doumeki's grandfather about him getting the "chicken poxs". The story had been further collaborated by Yuko when Himawari had sought her out for Watanuki—Yuko had found her before she could enter her store—and the older woman had explained that Watanuki also had the chicken poxs and that if she didn't want to get it, she better stay away.

"Is Watanuki here?" She asked. Her pigtails swinging back and forth as she looked around.

"You just missed him Himawari-chan. I bet he'll be overjoyed to see you." Yuko said, and she was getting ready to go find him. She put her hand on Himawari's shoulder and guided her outside. "I'll take you to him."

Himawari bowed to his grandfather and then she cheerfully waved at him. "I hope you feel better Doumeki. I'll come back and bring Watanuki." She looked at the little gift-wrapped bag she'd bought for him. "They're really good."

Doumeki who had already opened said gift-wrapped bag, agreed.

When a minute passed and his grandfather was still standing in the doorway, looking like he wanted to say something, the cry of "Hi-MA-WA-RI-CHANNN!" suddenly cut through the air like a one of Yuko-san's bats.

His grandfather turned in the direction of that ear-deafening yell…scream…mating call, not able to understand how such a small boy like Watanuki could make such large noises. The world was truly an amazing place.

His grandfather turned back to stare at him. "Are you feeling alright?"

"Yes." Doumeki answered truthfully, as the sight of Watanuki's blue eyes were like a cure all.

"You worry me, Shizuka. I nearly had a heart attack."

"You're not that old." Doumeki thought his grandfather was being over-dramatic. It was just a wound to the side, nothing to get all bent out of shape for, said the boy who was lying down in his futon doped up on enough painkillers or…Yuko's special blend to numb an elephant.

"Ah but I'm getting along in age. You can understand how I don't like my grandson getting himself into mischief." His grandfather smiled at him and it was always weird how his face got so cheerful when his words didn't seem that way.

"Oh that was so nice of you Himawari-chan. You made these for me?"

"No, I bought them from this really nice gateau shop. There was a two-for-one sale going on."

"Oh…right."

Doumeki heard Watanuki and Himawari before he could see them, the two of them walking into his room, Watanuki bearing scrambled eggs while Himawari bearing conversation.

His grandfather when he saw the two smiled and excused himself.

"It wasn't very fun, without you-" Kunogi said and Watanuki lighted up like a bulb on Christmas day.

"Really?"

"_Or _Doumeki around." She finished and she smiled at him in that completely oblivious way.

Doumeki didn't know if it was a default thing with Watanuki, but he knew Himawari would always get this reaction out of him.

That hurt-kicked-puppy-dog look.

He wondered when he'd be able to get Watanuki to give him _that_ look. He'd wait for that day.

Watanuki came up to his bedside and then sat down. "Here, sit up. I'm not spoon feeding you."

"Why not?" Doumeki asked.

"Your arms aren't broken."

Watanuki didn't know that. He could have broken them...within the last ten minutes. It could happen.

Doumeki rolled onto his uninjured side and propped his head up so Watanuki would see that he wanted to be spoon-fed.

Himawari laughed and told Watanuki that when she was sick, her parents usually spoon-fed her.

Watanuki laughed and buckled under the spoon-feeding pressure.

* * *

"Himawari-chan had come here before when you two were away." Yuko informed him, when Kunogi had left with farewells and promises to come visit tomorrow. 

"She did."

"Yes and she was standing under the Kuromatsu tree when she came." Yuko said mysteriously, not tying it with anything, but letting it tie itself. "That girl…" Yuko said, with a smile on her face. "However Watanuki wishes it, Himawari isn't his lucky draw…" Yuko finished, as she puffed on her pipe, her eyes cool in the night air and her lips a shade of enigma.

"Why?" Doumeki asked, because he didn't really get why Kunogi was such a bad omen when she was so nice to Watanuki and Watanuki didn't feel any bad vibes from her.

"Who knows?" Yuko said, getting up from her seat next to him as Watanuki walked in with the drinks that he had been about to serve her. Doumeki knew that the answer 'Who knows' was more like 'I know, but I'm not going to tell you, because you're going to find out one day, and it's going to be horrible, and Yuko's going to go drink her vodka now' answer.

Good thing he wasn't a worrier. He'd leave that to Watanuki.

"You're leaving already?" Watanuki asked, setting down the tray.

"Yes. I have to get back to the shop. Duty calls." She said slyly, like she had incoming sonar for all the potential victims of her shop…oh wait.

"Bye." Doumeki said and Watanuki sighed, because Yuko-san was renowned the world over for making him prepare things and then letting them go to waste due to her bad manners and tendencies to unexpectedly leave places mysteriously.

"Fine then. I'll see you tomorrow," Watanuki made a tired motion with his hands and Yuko slipped out of the door like a cat, only to pop her head right back in again. "Don't stay out too late Watanuki, but if you do," She looked at Doumeki, "Be prepared to come in early and make breakfast. I've missed you're cooking." She then slipped out again, like a snake into the night.

Watanuki stared at the spot his employer had formerly taken up. "That woman…" he smiled when he said it, so Doumeki knew there were no ill feelings towards "that woman." It was just like Watanuki, he would say things, but it was his actions that always spoke louder.

"Are you tired?"

Watanuki's glanced towards him and crawled over to where he lay on his futon. "No, strangely enough. If anything I feel like I can't sleep. I guess…" He trailed off when he noticed the stare Doumeki was giving him. "Maybe I should force myself to go to sleep. I'll have to get up early in the morning…" He gave a thoughtful pause, "Although even with little sleep I always manage fine in the mornings. I guess I'm a morning person."

"Ah." Doumeki nodded and sat up.

Watanuki got a panicked look, "You shouldn't just sit up like that." He put his hand on his shoulder to push him back down, but then his hand jumped away. "You have a cut on your shoulder…" Watanuki said, clenching his own forearm in apology.

"It's going away."

"And your cheek..." Watanuki passed his fingers over the bandage. "You're so careless. What if he had hit you in the eye…then what?"

Doumeki shrugged his shoulders.

Watanuki's hands fell away and he shook his head. "You really are a dumbass."

"I guess…but I'm not the only one." Doumeki placed his hand on top of Watanuki's and Watanuki gave him a 'what the hell are you doing?' look.

"Go to sleep. Your wounds aren't healed yet." Watanuki tugged his hand out from under his and prepared to stand up.

"Where are you going?"

"Home. I have to get ready for school tomorrow and you…you have to get better." Watanuki stood up and dusted his knees off. He looked at Doumeki and leaning over, he brushed some hair out of his face. "I hope it doesn't leave a scar."

"It won't. My grandfather made sure of that." Doumeki said, as he had noticed earlier that Yuko held in one of her hands yet another family heirloom. Thank god they had like…a million of those lying around.

"Oh…okay. Do you need me to get anything before I go?" Watanuki asked, feet shuffling and eyes all concerned.

"You can sit for a while." Doumeki patted the area next to him.

Watanuki sat and they looked at each other.

"I'm glad."

"That you're sitting here with me?" Doumeki supplied.

Watanuki rolled his eyes. "No…I'm glad that…it's a good thing you don't have a scar."

"You wouldn't like me if I had a scar?"

Watanuki looked at him like he was stupid. "I already don't like you. A scar won't change that…but I don't know, I'll remember from seeing it…you know. It's a pretty pathetic way of thinking, but I'm sorry…I just hate myself…for…"

"Uh-huh." Doumeki said absently, as he watched Watanuki's lips, but didn't hear the words that were going with them.

Watanuki glanced at him and when he realized that his face was coming closer, he frowned. "What the hell are you doing?"

"What does it look like I'm doing?"

"You…look I was trying to tell you something and you…"

"I'm listening," Doumeki said and his face was right in front of Watanuki's.

"Oh geez, I can't believe this." Watanuki pushed at his uninjured shoulder to put some space between them. "You're injured…how can you even be…thinking about…"

"Uh-huh." Doumeki said again, and leaned into him, his lips brushing against the corner of Watanuki's mouth as he rubbed his hands up and down the smaller boy's sides.

"You're going to…" Watanuki swallowed as Doumeki finally pressed his mouth to his, kissing his trembling lips as he tried to coax his mouth open. Watanuki shut his eyes and rebelliously pressed his lips together. Doumeki not deterred kissed his way back to Watanuki's cheek and jaw.

"You're going to reopen your wound."

"I'll be careful." Doumeki whispered and tried to get Watanuki on his back while the other boy tried to stop shaking within the needful little kisses being placed against the side of his lips.

"We can't." Watanuki whispered and looked at the door.

"Just think of it as an early birthday present."

"What?" Watanuki hissed.

"You didn't give me one last year." Doumeki explained, like that bit of information would clear up this situation.

"I didn't give you one last year because I didn't know you, you freak!"

"Well then start making it up to me." Doumeki said, and rolled Watanuki until he was on his stomach. "This won't hurt my side as much." He explained and even from this angle, he could see Watanuki's face go red.

"You lousy--"

"The happy birthday song doesn't start up like that," Doumeki reminded him and smiled, because like this Watanuki couldn't see the smirk on his face, and neither could he blow up at him for it.

The world was right again.

"I'll give you happy birthda-" Watanuki however was cut off from his rant, as Doumeki swiftly pulled down his pants and underwear, stripping him of the garments and tossing them away. "Goddamit, why is it that only sex makes you move with a purpose, you freakin' tree!"

Doumeki tugged off his yukata. "You don't mind if I use saliva, do you?"

Damn, it was like he wasn't even here. Doumeki was sure stubborn when he wanted to be, as Watanuki had learned over the past few weeks that Doumeki was strangely stubborn about sex. "Whatever." Watanuki replied, and it was his attempt at sounding casual, when his heart was beating like crazy in his chest and he couldn't get enough air into his lungs.

Doumeki licked across his nape, and with those motions, both cool and hot on the back of his neck, Doumeki prepared him.

"I'll go slow." Doumeki said, and he had pressed his nose into his neck and had grabbed onto the front of his thighs.

"Just…hurry up." Watanuki bit his bottom lip and tried not to make too much noise.

"Don't bite your lip."

"Don't…nggghh…tell me what to do."

Doumeki positioned himself, whispering hotly in his ear, "I'm leaking, so you don't have to worry about me pushing inside of you dry."

Watanuki felt his face go red. "You don't have to tell me everything!" God, Watanuki was sure the one thing that Doumeki lacked to be fundamentally human would have to be embarrassment…and a stomach with boundaries, but more importantly embarrassment. It was the exact reason why he could say things like this to Watanuki and expect him not to react the way he did.

He fitted himself inside Watanuki and the boy felt himself rocked forward into the futon, Doumeki's weight pressing into the small of his back. The pace picking up until Doumeki suddenly slowed down, like he remembered what he'd said earlier about going slow.

"Sor'ry." Doumeki whispered, his voice cracking on the second syllable as the feeling in his gut was pressing into his erection and furthermore making him press down into Watanuki. Slow, and thorough, and hard motions that had him sinking in all the way before practically pulling all the way out.

Watanuki fisted the sheets under him, his eyesight going blurry from the intense waves of friction running along the skin of his stomach. Doumeki's head was resting to the side of his, over one of his shoulders, that longer tuft of hair in front of Doumeki's face touching the mattress.

"I missed you." Doumeki whispered almost incoherently, and Watanuki knew the archer wasn't referring to time spent apart in the other world, or time spent apart in this. Doumeki in his own simply, Neanderthal way was telling him he missed _this._ Moments just like this, where they were alone and together. And in moments like this, like every other moment in their shared lives, they always said things that were small, not important to flow of things but still…made sense to them, made utter complete sense, even if they bickered and fought half the time and couldn't figure each other out completely.

Watanuki saw the flash of a fluid blackness staring at him. He turned his head and Doumeki was gazing at him. Watanuki could see Doumeki's arms flex above him, the archer moving forward to secure his mouth in a lip lock, his rhythm not speeding up, but becoming harder as he pushed him relentlessly into the futon under him.

They couldn't explain how much they felt for each other in words, but Doumeki thought this was enough to sum up that feeling. They could say they loved each other, but frankly it wouldn't mean anything to them. It wouldn't explain the vastness and complexity or the simplicity that their relationship was. Even this feeling, intense as it was, could only capture one moment of the need that existed between them, capture that intense feeling before they stopped feeling all together.

Doumeki grunted and closed his eyes, his mouth now burning a trail down Watanuki's shoulder as he continued to move, the feeling building and building on itself like layers of silk and patterns that wove themselves into something beautiful at their completion.

Watanuki came first. Against the sheets, his voice, clear as bells as he shouted and trembled. His eyes completely opened but seeing nothing, his ears hearing nothing but the last strangled groan from Doumeki as the boy convulsed and came.

The sound of their breathing mingling together in the room, like they're bodies and motions had before the breaking of release.

"I'm never going to get used to that." Doumeki said, panting and feeling over the skin of Watanuki's stomach.

"Where's my shoes-I mean glasses"-Watanuki flopped his hand out and then Doumeki leaning over, hitched Watanuki's glasses--glasses that were very much still on his face--up on the bridge of his nose in reminder.

"You mean your pants?" Doumeki asked, trying to wake his muscles back up from the comfortable slump they had taken.

"Shut up." Watanuki gave up on making sense and closed his eyes. "Get off me. You're heavy."

"Wait..." Doumeki said, and he began to pull out of Watanuki, who only sighed and melted further into the bed. "Stay here for the night."

Watanuki in all his after bliss glory curled into himself like a kitten and closed his eyes. Doumeki passing a hand over the bandage on his side hoped that he hadn't torn anything for the purposes of healing quickly and going back to school. Although, if he did, he deemed it was totally worth it, the sated, peaceful look on Watanuki's face attributing to his current satisfaction with himself…well that and the great sex.

* * *

**Two days later:**

"It's so weird."

"What's so weird?" I asked, as Watanuki looked behind him, a paranoid glaze to his eyes. We were currently walking back from school when Watanuki chose to upload his sudden realization on me. As to what realization that was, I was about to find out.

"Can't…you sense it?" Watanuki asked hopefully, then his face got that irritated, but in no way less cute look, and he stuck his nose up at me. "Forget it, you asshole. If you can't tell, then…just forget it."

"You look especially nice today." I said. Just to see how he'd take that, since he wasn't going to tell me what was actually bothering him.

"That--that has nothing to…god you're dumb!"

"The pot calling the kettle-"

"Shut up! Fine, since you're so inept, I guess I'll have to tell you." He looked around then, like a man running from the law and with an overly spooked out voice he said, "Nothing's following me."

He looked to me for a response.

"That's a problem?" I asked, obviously not understanding why he was so freaked out about ditching his ghost problem. "Maybe they took a vacation…or somethin'-

It was here that I realized I was walking into dangerous territory, especially with Watanuki glaring at me like he was right now.

"You idiot. This is important. Even when I'm not with you, they still don't follow me around...like they used to."

He looked to me for a response.

I shrugged my shoulders.

"Gah!!!!" He stopped in the middle of the road and I had to duck his book satchel. Then I had to duck it again, because Watanuki was fond of attempting to decapitate me by way of book bag. "It's been going on for two days now--or I started to notice it two days ago-- and I have no explanation for it, and every time I approach Yuko-san about it, she laughs and tells me I'm getting at that age."

Watanuki looked baffled, then annoyed, then went back to being baffled and somewhere within those five seconds, his face was a mixture of baffled annoyance.

I mulled over his words. He said it was two days ago, but nothing other than sex stood out in my mind…Glorious, glorious sex. Well at least I had my priorities straight.

"It's not right." Watanuki bellowed, looking around nervously because no scary ghosts were following after him. It was like today was opposite day.

"Aren't you supposed to be happy?" I asked.

"No, this could be a trick, like a calm before the storm thing. You know?"

I furrowed my brow and thought that if Watanuki missed his beloved ghosts so much, I could always lock him up in a room with a coffin and see where to take it from there.

"It's weird." He said again.

Then something hit me, something that had me smirking on the outside and laughing on the in.

Watanuki noticed the expression change.

"Your face," he said, "Fix it."

"My blood…" I started up casually, "It keeps the ghosts away."

Watanuki threw a 'duh' expression my way.

I went for it. "Then what do you suppose happens with other…fluids?" I smiled or smirked because all the smiles I ever aimed at Watanuki always came out like smirks.

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"You think the ghost can smell it on you." I asked and enjoyed the perplexed expression that I was met with.

"Smell what? Smell…" Then something clicked in Watanuki's hollow head.

"EWWWW! YOU SICKO--GET AWAY FROM ME!!!"

Ah, just the response I wanted.

"THAT CAN'T BE THE REASON! IT'S NOT! IT'S NOT!"

Stage one of the denial process.

"IT'S NOT TRUE!"

I don't know what it was about Watanuki screeching at me like that, but for some reason it turned me on. Go figure.

I leered. "If it's the reason, you're going to have to let me come inside you more." I said without the faintest hint of embarrassment.

Watanuki's eyes bugged. He dropped his satchel.

"You--why…I haven't done anything to deserve this…"

This couldn't get any better if Buddha himself came down here and told me I'd won the lottery and that I could use the money to buy Watanuki and make him my personal slave…_forever_.

Good times. Good times.

"NOOOOOO!" And then Watanuki was on the ground, and he was crying, and wailing, and making noises that should have frightened me, but were just turning me on even more. I supposed Watanuki's annoyance was something I got off on. Hmm. These revelations should make me want to reevaluate myself as a human being, but all they did was make me happy that I was alive and that, at this very moment I was experiencing this blessed event.

"How could --You can't be my wish. It's not possible. I've worked so hard and to have _YOU_ be the result--You disgusting pervert…I…"

I patted Watanuki on the back as condolence.

And just to hit it home that this was his reality, for the rest of his life. I said, "Offer up thanks. Be grateful that you no longer have to worry about ghosts. I'm like…your savior."

If I died right now, I could honestly say that I had gotten everything I ever wanted out of life.

"I saved you from the ghosts plaguing you." I said and it never got old the way his face lit up in horror and embarrassment.

Watanuki summoning all the lung capacity that resided within his small body, bellowed out, **"THEN WHO'S GOING TO SAVE ME FROM YOU?!"**

"No one." I said, as I stalked up to him.

The End.

**

* * *

A/n:** Finally! OMG, I finished. Thanks for all those that stuck with you. You're probably wondering what happened to the beautiful, thought-provoking ending…well that's not my style. I guess. Watanuki throwing himself in Doumeki's arms and saying he loves him for eternity isn't something I can picture…I guess I'm cold-hearted or somethin' like that. Also the utter crack at the ending, where I changed povs and went back to first person Doumeki pov was just my way of bringing the story ultimate conclusion. I mean Doumeki's blood scares away ghosts so what would happen if…yeah you probably don't want me to finish that line. Of course the ghosts aren't going to leave Watanuki completely alone, but it's still fun to mess with him like this. I had way too much fun with this chapter. 

1.Yogatta is an expression of relief. Something like, thank god.

2. Cheongsam- translates to 'long tunic' It's one of those form fitting Chinese dresses. Just think fancier for Yuko, because Clamp is as much fashion designers as they are character designers. Men can also wear one, like D in Petshop of Horrors. I am getting off topic.


End file.
